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Stocks fall continues

Key DSE index down to 2-year low; small investors block traffic

Staff Correspondent
A continuous slide in share prices yesterday pulled the key index of the Dhaka bourse down to a two-year-low.
The General Index of Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) came down to 4,638 points after shedding 71 points at the close of yesterday's trade. The benchmark indexwas4,643 points on January 4,2010.
Bangladesh Share Investors' Association (BSIA), a platform of retail investors, called a daylong shutdown for today in Motijheel demanding stability in the stockmarket, but later they backtracked on the decision.
"We decided to call off the hartal fol-
lowing assurances from police that our detained leaders would be released if the strike was withdrawn,” Shahadatullah Firoz, organising secretary of BSIA, told The Daily Star.
Earlier, police had picked up eight small investors, including the BSIA president, from Motijheel on charges of blocking roads and vandalising vehicles.
The arrestees are BSIA president Mizanur Rashid Chowdhury, secretary Abdur Razzak, vice-president Selim Chowdhury and international affairs secretary Ataullah Nayeem, investors Nurul Haque, Abdul Mannan, Abu Sufiyan and Abdul Hannan.
They were not freed till midnight last night, said Hayatuzzaman Mollah, officer-in-charge of Motijheel Police Station.
A group of retail investors started demonstrating in front of the DSE building around 12:30pm, blocking the road from Shapla Chattar to Ittefaq crossing.
They put up barricades on the road by igniting different objects, including abandoned wooden boxes and papers.
They walked in processions chanting slogans. They also carried a dummy coffin to signify the death of the investors, but police took it away from them.
Some aggrieved investors also tried to place several brokerage firms under the lock.
At 5:00pm, police charged batons on the agitators to disperse them and traffic movement resumed 15 minuteslater.
During the day's trading at DSE, the losers beat the gainers 178 to 63, with prices of 16 securities remaining unchanged. Over 5.04 crore shares and mutual fund units were traded at a value of Tk 233 crore.
Stock experts said lack of active participation of institutional investors coupled with huge sale pressure from retail investors led to the market dipping further.
The experts, however, could not ascertain the reason behind the slowdown in institutional investment.
"If the index hovers below this level for a few days, this may become the new resistance level. If we consider distortion in the index caused by GP and other stocks, the original index value would be around 3,500 points,” said LankaBangla Securities in its daily market analysis.
At this level barely any investor has his nose over the water, it said, and added that the overall market PE had come down to 11.41, which is the lowest in the region after Pakistan.