Anisuzzaman Chowdhury assures stakeholders of govt actions to develop market

Special assistant to the chief adviser, Dr Anisuzzaman Chowdhury has assured market stakeholders of taking necessary measures for the development of the capital market.

His assurance came on Tuesday at a meeting held at the Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) with the stakeholders of the market.

Several meeting participants while talking to the FE over the phone said Mr Chowdhury deemed the market as a source of long-term financing.

Saiful Islam, president of the DSE Brokers Association (DBA) quoted Mr Chowdhury as saying that, "There are a lot of problems and the government will do whatever is needed for the development of the capital market".

The special assistant to the CA had a discussion with representatives of the listed companies, merchant banks, stockbrokers, and asset management companies as part of the government's move to bring necessary reforms to the capital market.

The market representatives shared their opinions and observations. Many of them insisted upon a quick solution to negative equity.

DBA President Mr. Islam said they had communicated their dissatisfaction with the performance of the BSEC and said that the regulator excused itself from taking any action on the pretext that it was awaiting recommendations from the task force.

Apart from improving the supply size, the exchanges' demutualization act should be revised to make the bourses functional, DBA said at the meeting.

President of the Bangladesh Association of Publicly Listed Companies (BMBA) Ms Rupali Chowdhury told Mr Chowdhury that the capital market fails to attract good companies for the lack of incentives and complicated listing process.

She said the previous gap of 15 per cent between corporate tax rates for listed and non-listed companies had inspired companies to go public. The tax gap had gradually been reduced to 5 per cent.

The complicated public issue rules also create impediments to the listing of good companies as they would rather prefer to take bank loans. It takes only three months to get a loan from banks whereas it takes more than a year to complete an IPO (initial public offering) process, Ms Rupali said.

President of the Bangladesh Merchant Bankers Association (BMBA) Ms Mazeda Khatun said reforms in the primary market should get priority for the sake of a well-functioning secondary market.

Non-listed companies do not follow any systematic process in forming capitals in absence of proper monitoring.

"If non-listed companies get a strong base, the secondary market will get good companies," Mazeda told the meeting. She also said stringent actions should be taken at the right time to contain irregularities and corruption.

Managing Director of Central Depository Bangladesh Limited (CDBL) Abdul Mutaleb said many companies often did not complete the distribution of cash dividends. A third party may be deployed to ensure shareholders get dividends as promised, he added.

At the meeting, the Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE) said they had already invested Tk 1 billion out of Tk 1.4 billion to commence the operation of the country's maiden commodity exchange (CX).

The port city bourse made a plea for a quick completion of the process at the regulator's end to start the operation of the CX.