Stocks end flat on hartal day

Stocks ended flat yesterday thanks to the institutional investors' inactiveness to inject fresh funds into the market.
DGEN, the key market-tracking index of Dhaka Stock Exchange, finished the day at 4,086.05 points, after falling 0.61 points or 0.01 percent.
Although some institutional investors, including the association of commercial banks, announced a plan to support the market last week, no such effort was there to tackle the bearish run, according to market analysts.
The Securities and Exchange Commission should give long-term policy support to the market to boost investors' confidence, they said.
A slow session closed with flat movement on 'hartal day' after previous two sessions downhill, said IDLC Investments in its regular market analysis.
"Hartal sentiment influenced the market pulse. As a result, investors were not keen to participate in trading and turnover touched the five months' lowest level of Tk 154 crore,” it said.
Turnover declined 9.41 percent from the previ-ous day. The investment banker said: “Investors adopted a 'wait-and-see policy' amid the rise of political violence.”
A total of 54.70 lakh trades were executed with 4.13 crore shares and mutual fund units changing hands on the Dhaka bourse.
Unique Hotel and Resorts was the most traded stock of the day, due to the transaction of its 19.20 lakh shares worth Tk 23.14 crore, which is 15 percent of the day's total trade.
Of the 259 issues that traded on the DSE, 163 advanced, 66 declined and 30 remained unchanged.
Most of the major sectors showed mixed performance on the day. Among them, non-bank financial institutions posted the highest gain of 1.06 percent, followed by pharma 0.40 percent and power 0.25 percent.