Stocks rebound after six-day plunge

Stock markets in Bangladesh rebounded yesterday after a six-day plunge as investors made fresh bets on lucrative shares to pocket short-term gains amidst price movements.

Shares of companies like Islami Bank Bangladesh, Beacon Pharmaceuticals, Khan Brothers PP Woven Bag Industries, Square Pharmaceuticals, United Commercial Bank, Bangladesh Submarine Cables, IFIC Bank, Delta Life Insurance, Orion Pharma and Prime Bank drew investors the most, according to LankaBangla Financial Portal.

Of them, Islami Bank Bangladesh is the only company that saw a double-digit growth of 13.28 percent in share prices.

However, shares of Confidence Cement, Taufika Foods and Lovello Ice-cream, Eastern Housing, GPH Ispat, Unilever Consumer Care, Paramount Textile, Shahjalal Islami Bank, Al-Arafah Islami Bank, Uttara Bank and Hami Industries suffered losses.

As such, the DSEX, the benchmark index of Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), edged up by 73.29 points, or 1.30 percent, from that on the day prior to close at 5,702.

DSEX, the benchmark index of Dhaka Stock Exchange, edged up by 73.29 points, or 1.30 percent, to close at 5,702

Similarly, the DSES index of the Shariah-based companies grew 20.25 points, or 1.67 percent, to 1,235. Meanwhile, the DS30 index that is composed of blue-chip firms added 22.22 points, or 1.06 percent, to reach 2,114.

At the Chittagong Stock Exchange, the CASPI, the prime index of the port city bourse, went up by 62.72 points, or 0.39 percent, to settle at 16,127.

Of the issues that changed hands on the country's premier bourse, prices of 273 went up, 76 closed lower and 47 did not witness any price fluctuations.

The day's turnover, which indicates the total value of shares traded on the DSE, stood at Tk 5,62.7 crore, a decrease of 9.44 percent compared to the previous day's trading session.

Olympic Industries was the most traded share with a turnover of Tk 32.4 crore followed by Linde Bangladesh, BRAC Bank and Grameenphone.

The turnover of block trades, meaning high-volume transactions in securities that are privately negotiated and executed outside the open market, stood at Tk 38.8 crore, representing 6.9 percent of the day's total turnover.

In its daily market update, Shanta Securities said yesterday's market movement was driven by positive changes in the market capitalisation of travel and leisure, paper and printing, and bank scrips.

Market capitalisation refers to the total value of a company's outstanding shares. Meanwhile, there were negative changes in the market capitalisation of financial institutions, cement and real estate scrips.

Most of the large-cap sectors posted a positive performance yesterday, with pharmaceuticals experiencing the highest gain of 1.48 percent, according to the daily market update by BRAC EPL Stock Brokerage.

Large-cap refers to companies that account for high amounts in market capitalisation.

The banking sector logged a gain of 1.35 percent followed by telecommunication, engineering, and fuel and power with gains of 0.93 percent, 0.88 percent and 0.81 percent respectively.

Food and allied sector recorded a gain of 0.03 percent while non-bank financial institutions posted a loss of 0.24 percent.