DSEX hits biggest single-day rise in two months

Stocks witnessed steepest rise on Sunday with the benchmark DSEX index hitting its largest single-day rally in two months.

A week after recording the downturn, bottom hunters gathered to push the benchmark index higher to register the rally after Bangladesh set a uniform dollar-taka exchange rate for international trade to curb currency volatility, dealers say.

As soon as the market opened in the morning, the DSEX crossed 6,300-level after a week before settling at 6,369 with a gain of 131 points or 2 per cent. With the rise, the index accumulated 181 points in the two consecutive sessions.

Fortunately for the market, the new lower limit circuit breaker norms, introduced on Wednesday, and extending credit facilities came to the rescue of the market, according to the dealers.

Sunday’s rebound was led mainly by all the sectors driven by financial institutions, telecommunications, cement, textile, and pharmaceutical stocks.

The gainers strongly outnumbered the losers as out of 377 issues traded, 342 closed positive, 25 negative and 10 remained unchanged.

“The index rose for a second consecutive day, propelled by across-the-board buying after the market regulator came up with policy support to rescue a prolonged bearish market,” said the EBL Securities in a note.

Investor confidence seemed to restore as the securities regulator, in a bid to revamp the ailing market, again set a 2 per cent circuit breaker, it said.

Previously introduced policies such as increased margin credit facility and extension of capital-market refinancing fund also contributed to the market rise, said the EBL Securities.

Besides, bourses observed a substantial increase in participation while turnover has advanced by 54.6% and stood at BDT 8.33bn as against BDT 5.4bn in the previous session.

On Sunday, dealers recommended devaluing taka by nearly Tk 2 against the US dollar as they submitted their interbank exchange rate proposal to the central bank. The dealers suggested the Bangladesh Bank to fix the interbank rate at Tk 89.8 per dollar, which is now Tk 87.9. The taka plunged by around Tk 2 against the US dollar since January this year.

The port city bourse, CSE, also settled in green terrain. The selected indices (CSCX) and All Share Price Index (CASPI) have advanced by 219.1 and 367.0, respectively.