Stocks suffer steep losses a day after record turnover

The country’s bourses dove headfirst into a steep tumble on Wednesday following a year-high turnover the previous day.

All indices and turnover on the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) fell on the day. Among the traded securities, the number of losing issues was three times higher than gainers.

Such unusual behaviour in the capital market is being observed for several days — most stocks trading lower every session, but the indices declining only on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Among the two days, the biggest fall this week so far was on Wednesday with the transaction value also dropping by more than a thousand crore taka.

At the end of the day, DSEX, the benchmark index of the Dhaka bourse decreased by 45 points or 0.68 percent to 6,551.

Among other indices, the shariah-based DSES fell by 12.02 points or 0.83 percent and the blue-chip DS-30 was down by 26.93 points or 1.12 percent.

The DSE had a turnover of Tk 1,808 crore, which is about Tk 1,024 crore less than the previous session.

About the overall situation in the market, Richard de Rozario, President of DSE Brokers Association (DBA) said, there is a kind of fear and panic among investors about the market.

“In this panic, one group is selling shares, another group is in the mood for profit taking. The price has fallen due to these two reasons,” he said.

He added, “Wednesday’s fall was normal. But what is scary is that the market is moving on a few issues. If these issues increase, both the index and turnover advance. If it decreases again, the market turns negative.”

On the day, shares of the 371 companies were traded, of which only 58 firms gained, 159 issues lost and 154 companies remained unchanged.

The pharmaceuticals and chemicals sector has played a major role behind this rise in transactions. The total turnover in this sector was Tk 456.2 crore, which is 26.39 percent of the total turnover.

The miscellaneous sector was at the second position with Tk 419.7 crore turnover, followed by fuel and power sector at Tk 129.7 crore.

Shares of Orion Pharma were the most-traded by value on the DSE as its shares worth Tk 257.25 crore were traded on the day.

Beximco Limited, which was the second most-traded stock, had a turnover of Tk 229.69 crore followed by BSC, JHRML, SPCL, LafargeHolcim, Orion Infusion, ACME Laboratories, BPML and Shinepukur Ceramics.

Meanwhile, the overall index CASPI of the Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE) decreased over 131 points to 19,319 and securities worth Tk 126.46 crore were traded on the day.