Dhaka Stock Exchange’s Chinese Director Xie Wenhai has failed to repatriate his honorarium received from the stock exchange’s board meeting as China's local law does not permit it.
He becomes one of the strategic shareholders of the DSE after the Chinese consortium of the Shenzhen and Shanghai Stock Exchanges bought a 25 per cent stake in the DSE in 2018.
The Chinese director's total board meeting fee so far stood at Tk 9.5 lakh. Of the figure, he has already been paid Tk 3 lakh and the rest of the honorarium worth Tk 6.5 lakh is left unused.
The DSE pays Tk 10,000 in honorarium per board meeting. Normally, the Chinese director attends the meeting online.
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In an email, Xie Wenhai said that he would not be able to take his honorarium back home as China’s local law does not permit it, said a DSE director requesting not to be named.
He is also the deputy director-general of Shenzhen Stock Exchange (SZSE).
Meanwhile, the country’s prime bourse has been failing to utilise opportunities from the Chinese consortium, they said.
The DSE, on May 14, 2018, struck a deal with the consortium allowing it to buy 25 per cent of its ordinary shares for Tk947 crore. But its performance has left the stakeholders disappointed.
“We haven’t found any specific move from the consortium to bring investments to Bangladesh, other than deepening the market depth," said the DSE director.
The Chinese director appointed by the consortium on the DSE board joined board meetings through video conferencing, and the board hardly got any input from him.
Experts said that the DSE management fails to utilize opportunities from the Chinese consortium due to a lack of skilled manpower and inefficient management.
The Chinese consortium of the SZSE and the Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE) had offered to share its experience in market design, information disclosure, investor suitability management supervision, IPO promotion, and other areas of interest for the development of a Bangladesh SME market.
SZSE has developed a financing supply chain for start-up companies, involving venture capital, investment banks, small-loan companies, commercial banks, and other financial intermediaries to help start-ups.
According to the Stock Exchange Demutualization Act 2013, 40 per cent of the DSE’s shares were credited to its members’ accounts, while the remaining 60 per cent were kept in a blocked account.
The remaining 35 per cent would be floated through an initial public offering (IPO) by the exchange.
Stakeholders believe that DSE expects a well-regulated and technically sound stock market for the betterment of the investors as well as the shareholders with the help of the consortium.
