Banks perk up stocks

The Dhaka stocks rose nearly 42 points or 0.73 percent yesterday as investors went for buying banking shares, which had been on a losing streak for the last few days.

The benchmark index of the premier bourse— DSEX—finished the day at 5,755.79.

Although most of the stocks experienced a fall, the index of Dhaka Stock Exchange rose yesterday thanks to the rise of the high valued banking stocks.

Of the shares of 30 banks, 24 rose and three remained unchanged.

Of the traded issues, 137 advanced, 166 declined and 42 closed unchanged on the premier bourse.

Turnover, another important indicator of the market, also jumped 23.69 percent to Tk 718.24 crore, with 13.02 crore shares and mutual fund units changing hands on the DSE.

According to IDLC Securities data, top three positive index contributors were Brac Bank, Square Pharmaceuticals and Grameenphone.

Among the major sectors, telecom rose 2.9 percent, banks 2 percent and non-bank financial institutions 0.60 percent while energy dropped 0.2 percent and engineering 0.6 percent. Square Pharmaceuticals dominated the turnover chart with 16.45 lakh shares worth Tk 45.03 crore changing hands, followed by The Monno Ceramics, Khulna Power, Bangladesh Submarine cables and Grameenphone.

ICB AMCL Second NRB was the day's best performer with 6.02 percent gain while Imam Button was the worst loser, shedding 9.18 percent.

Chittagong stocks also soared with the bourse's benchmark index, CSCX, increasing 53.14 points or 0.50 percent to finish the day at 10,654.26.

Losers beat gainers as 135 declined, 81 advanced and 38 finished unchanged on the Chittagong Stock Exchange. The port city bourse traded 54.50 crore shares and mutual fund units worth Tk 22.86 crore.