Country’s stock market yet to take shape of real capital market: Muhith

UNB, Dhaka :
Finance Minister AMA Muhith on Thursday said that the country’s stock market has not yet taken the shape of a real capital market.
He also agreed with an observation that most of the investors prefer short-term business and want quick gains through buying in the morning and selling in the afternoon.
Muhith made the observations during a meeting with a joint delegation of Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) and Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE), which placed a number of demands including bringing amendment to the tax related proposals in the proposed national budget for fiscal 2014-15.
Banking and Financial Institutions Division secretary Dr Aslam Alam and Bangladesh Security and Exchange Commission (BSEC) chairman Prof Dr M Khairul Hossain, DSE chairman Justice Siddiqur Rahman Miah and CSE chairman Abdul Mazid also spoke at the meeting at the Finance Ministry.
Holding racketeers responsible for destroying capital market, the Finance Minister said: “They are not investors. They are racketeers.”
Supporting a proposal for offloading of the government-held shares of different companies to the private investors through stock market, he said that currently the market is more stable than before. “So, the publicly held shares should be released through the capital market to private investors.”
Muhith also suggested that many big companies, which did not yet come to the stock market, can come to the market with their shares as capital market situation is now better than before.
He also directed the authorities concerned to take steps about the release of money to hand over to the investors which are now stuck up in the OTC market and in the process placement issues. The amount is assumed to be more than Tk 5000 crore.
Dr Aslam Alam said though the government has been successful in banks and other places in checking the money laundering, there is no breakthrough in this regard in the stock markets because of its weak rules and regulations.
“The market operators have to know their clients before dealing with them,” he said.
BSEC chairman Prof Dr M Khairul Hossain said that in the existing mechanism of stock market, the regulator can check unusual and abnormal trading. But when the market experiences fall, regulator cannot invest itself to stop the fall, but investors blame the regulator for the fall which is unfair.
DSE chairman Justice Siddiqur Rahman said the DSE itself has no capital to check any fall in the market.
CSE chairman Abdul Mazid said the government should not take any tax related measures which will directly affect the market as stock market is a very sensitive market.