MIDAS Investment sets foot to boost stockmarket

MIDAS Investment, a subsidiary of MIDAS Financing, started its journey as a full-fledged merchant bank aiming to increase its presence and activities in the capital market and contribute to the development of the stockmarket.

Finance Minister AMA Muhith inaugurated the commercial operation of the merchant bank at a programme held at MIDAS Convention Centre in Dhaka yesterday.

As a full-fledged merchant bank, MIDAS Investment will work to encourage non-listed companies to come to the stockmarket. It will also carry out other merchant banking activities such as issue management, underwriting, portfolio management and corporate advisory services.

The objective behind the journey of MIDAS Financing and its parent organisation MIDAS was to support the development of micro, small and medium enterprises, said Rokia Afzal Rahman, chairman of MIDAS Financing and MIDAS Investment.

MIDAS Financing, from its birth, has extended its cooperation to entrepreneurs by taking different initiatives to encourage them.

It has been working vigorously for the last 16 years as a friend of the entrepreneurs, she said.

Now in the case of MIDAS Investment, the purpose is the same, she said, adding that all three organisations would like to be a part of the finance minister's dream of achieving 8 percent economic growth.

“Small borrowers return the credit on time. But it's the big borrowers who fail to do so,” she added.

The finance minister said MIDAS started its journey as a non-governmental organisation in the 1980s and then it was run by foreign assistance.

“But now MIDAS has become self-dependent. It is laudable,” Muhith said.

There are many companies that do not want to get listed on the stock exchanges for various reasons, said Shafique-ul-Azam, managing director of MIDAS Financing.

But the non-listed companies can reduce their dependency on bank loans by raising capital from the stockmarket.

MIDAS Investment will work to bring the non-listed companies to the capital market, he added.

At present, 55 merchant banks operate in the stockmarket.

Among the banks, 51 are full-fledged merchant banks, which simultaneously perform the functions of an issue manager, a portfolio manager and an underwriter. The remaining four merchant banks carry out the functions of either an issue manager or a portfolio manager or both.