GP shares tank after BTRC bans SIM card sales

Grameenphone (GP) shares on Thursday plunged as much as 2 per cent to over Tk 294 after the telecom regulator banned the sale of new SIM cards by the country’s largest mobile phone operator.

The drop took its share prices to the level seen on August 23, 2020, and the stock posted its biggest intraday fall in recent years on the Dhaka Stock Exchange.

GP shares began trading in the morning at just a little over Tk 300 but fell by Tk 6 in the first hour before closing at Tk 294.1.

During the trading hour, more than 1.72 lakh shares of the telecom operator were traded. The benchmark DSEX index gained over 26 points or 0.4 per cent to close at almost 6377.

The market’s heavyweight GP made its stock market debut in 2009, accounting for nearly 8 per cent of the DSE total market cap.

The telecom operator’s customer base was around 8.5 crore as of May, making up 46 per cent of total mobile phone users, the highest among the four mobile phone operators in the country.

On Wednesday, the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission issued an order blocking GP from selling new connections, citing the “poor quality” of the operator’s services.

“The quality of Grameenphone’s service isn’t improving despite it being the top mobile phone operator with a large customer base. They’ve failed to develop sufficient infrastructure to provide services to so many customers despite repeated reminders,” said the BTRC

GP reported a net profit of Tk 809.82 crore for the quarter ended March 2022, down 9 per cent from Tk 890.63 crore in the year-ago period. Its net asset value per share was Tk 42.94 as of March 31, 2022, down 4 per cent from Tk 45.19 in the same period a year earlier.