Stocks down for 3rd straight week

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Babul Barman The losing streak of the country's prime bourse continued for the third consecutive week with the key index dipping below 3,900-point mark as investors went for a selling spree amid growing uncertainties in the political frontier. It was the last week ahead of the nine-day Eid and Puja holidays which started from Friday (October 11). Brokers said fear of fresh turmoil in political frontier and investors' preference for naturalising short-term return ahead of Eid-ul-Azha streamlined the week's market sentiment. The week witnessed five trading sessions as usual. Among them, the market saw a sharp decline in the first three trading sessions while the last two gained marginally. Week-on-week, the Benchmark Index of the Dhaka Stock Exchange - DSEX - went down by 104.89 points or 2.66 per cent to close below the level of 3,900 points to 3,843.56 points. The DS30 Index, comprising blue chips, also declined sharply by 53.99 points or 3.74 per cent to close the week at 1,387.95 points. The Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE) also ended lower with its Selective Category Index losing 227.53 points or 2.94 per cent to close the week at 7,494.18 points. Turnover remained dry on DSE as total turnover for the week stood at Tk 11.90 billion against Tk 13.95 billion of the previous week. The daily average turnover value came down to Tk 2.38 billion, registering a 14.73 per cent decline over the previous week's average value of Tk 2.79 billion. "Dragged by cashing out ahead of long closure for Eid-ul-Azha amid much more sluggish participation streamlined this week's market sentiment," commented IDLC Investments, in its weekly market analysis. "Consistent positioning of index below psychological level of 4,000 points in line with fear of further decline fuelled the week's decaying vibe and forced investors' mood turning into a selling spree," the merchant bank said. "The market remained highly attuned to the latest news coming from political arena and traded somewhat erratically last week," said LankaBangla Securities, a leading stock broker. From the economic perspective, the current period largely played out more than expected as export and import showed comforting growth of 21.24 per cent in first quarter of the current fiscal year. "Market continues to take battering as total turnover volume dips further with both the indices closed in a negative territory as the market fails to accommodate consolidation," stated Zenith Investments. Throughout the week, investors followed previous two weeks' trend and positioned mostly in textile and pharmaceutical sectors, accounted for 20.22 per cent and 14.52 per cent of market turnover respectively. The losers took a strong lead over the gainers as out of 293 issues traded during the week, 249 declined, 38 advanced and 6 remained unchanged on the prime bourse. The market capitalisation of the DSE went down by 2.62 per cent as it was Tk 2,530.43 billion on the opening day of the week and it stood at Tk 2,464.17 billion on closing day of the week. Delta Life Insurance became the week's top turnover leader with shares worth Tk 507.72 million changing hands followed by Argon Denim, Square Pharma, Envoy Textile and BSCCL. Argon Denim was the week's top gainer, posting a rise of 24.18 per cent while Fine Foods was the week's worst loser, slumping by 29.43 per cent.