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The Dhaka Stock Exchange and the Chittagong Stock Exchange at a meeting on Wednesday worked out a set of recommendations for the expected guidelines for opening and operating branches of brokerage houses as the SEC is going to formulate the guidelines soon.
   ‘We have prepared a formula on opening and operating branches of brokerage firms,’ DSE chief executive officer Salahuddin Ahmed Khan told New Age after the meeting.
   He said the recommendations would be submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission, stock market regulatory body, for its consideration before formulating the guidelines.
   In last week, a senior official of SEC said the commission would soon formulate guidelines for opening branches of brokerage houses in and outside the capital in order to protect the interest of the investors.
   He said the regulatory body took the move as it was concerned whether branches of brokerage houses were being regulated and monitored for compliance with the securities laws.
   Opening branches of brokerage houses recently marked significant rise across the country with expansion of the stock market. The DSE is now operating 440 branches in 11 district towns in Bangladesh, said capital market sources.
   Salahuddin said DSE and CSE board members including the bourses’ presidents and vice-presidents attended the meeting held at the DSE board room.
   They also held a meeting with the SEC chairman on Wednesday and apprised him of the outcome of the meeting, said the DSE CEO.
   Stocks lost on Wednesday due to selling pressure from investors after the previous day’s rise, said market operators.
   The DSE general index lost 17.15 points or 0.55 per cent to close at 3079.09, while its blue chips index, DSE20, shed 2.58 points or 0.11 per cent to finish at 2371.22.
   A DSE stock broker said market witnessed selling pressure after the Tuesday’s marginal rise in share prices.
   The CSE selective categories index lost 28.14 points or 0.50 per cent to close at 5566.01, while its blue chips index, CSE30, shed 2.39 points or 0.03 per cent to close at 7570.05.
   Of the total 244 issues traded at the DSE, 94 gained, 138 declined and 12 remained unchanged and out of 147 issues traded at the CSE, 52 posted gains, 92 dropped and three remained unchanged.
   Turnover at the DSE decreased to Tk 269.94 crore from the Tuesday’s Tk 273.93 crore and the CSE turnover went down to Tk 33.92 crore from Tk 35.91 crore.
   AB Bank topped the turnover leaders at the DSE with total transaction of Tk 18.99 crore.
   Other turnover leaders at the prime bourse were Aims 1st Mutual Fund, Union Capital, IFIC Bank, ACI, Square Pharmaceuticals, Keya Cosmetics, United Commercial Bank, LankaBangla Finance and Beximco Pharmaceuticals.

Commerce adviser Hossain Zillur Rahman on Wednesday assured the officials of insurance companies that he would sit with the management of Sadharan Bima Corporation to settle the reinsurance claims pending for years together.
   The government would take realistic decision and instruct the state-owned insurance company to settle the reinsurance claims at phases, he said at a meeting with the top executives of insurance companies. Bangladesh Insurance Association organised the meeting.
   The insurance companies claimed that over 400 claims for amounting to around Tk 229 crore were remaining unsettled with the state-owned SBC till June 2006. So far, not a single claim was settled although the commerce secretary in August last year instructed the SBC to resolve 50 per cent of the claims by December 2007.
   The government would look into the matter of reducing the mandatory reinsurance ratio with the SBC from 50 per cent to 10 per cent.
   According to the rules general insurance companies must place 50 per cent of their reinsurance with the SBC and 50 per cent with other insurance companies at home or abroad.
   The adviser said commerce ministry would sit with the National Board of Revenue soon to reduce the insurance companies’ tax rate, which is fixed at 45 per cent.
   Amendment to the insurance laws would be promulgated soon, he hoped.
   The foreign companies do not like to insure themselves with the local insurance companies as they take long time in settling up claims, said AKM Rafiqul Islam, president of the Bangladesh Insurance Association.
   The government should allow the life insurance companies to invest in zero coupon bonds to get better return, he observed.
   There are 17 life and 43 general insurance companies operating in the country. The companies earned premium of Tk 3257 crore and settled claims worth Tk 821 crore in 2006.

The National Board of Revenue has taken a go-slow approach to catch new taxpayers, as the netting of new taxpayers and tax evasion have created panic among the taxpayers, especially the businessmen.
   The NBR began a tax survey on businessmen on March 29 last year at all divisional headquarters and in Rangpur municipal area.
   A total of 48 teams have been conducting the survey covering businesses and professionals across the country. Of them, 20 teams are conducting survey in capital Dhaka.
   Sectors covered in the NBR survey: 1. clinics and diagnostic centres, 2. community centres, residential hotels and restaurants, Chinese restaurants and fast food shops, sweetmeat, bakery and confectionery shops, 3. commercially run English/Bangla medium schools and coaching centres, 4. internet and computer centres, 5. beauty parlours, fitness centres and physiotherapy centres, 6. firms of lawyers, physicians, engineers, tax lawyers, chartered accountants, cost and management accountants, and architects, 7. book stalls, book binding shops, printing presses, travel agencies, and advertising firms, 8. machinery shops, grocery shops, general stores, retail shops, and department stores, 9. shopping malls and super markets, 10. thread producers, thread dying, finishing, coning and weaving houses, textiles manufactures, 11. real estate companies and developers, 12. saw mills, rice mills, flour mills, oil mills, and timber traders, 13. tailoring, laundry and sanitary ware shops, and 14. phone-fax and laminating centres, cassette-CD shops, etc.

The Bangladesh Bank is mulling to set compulsory agriculture credit disbursement target for the commercial banks at the beginning of the next fiscal year.
   ‘This is to facilitate timely disbursement so the farmers can effectively utilize the loan,’ Bangladesh Bank deputy governor Nazrul Huda told the news agency Wednesday.
   In view of the two recurrent floods and devastating cyclone Sidr last year, Bangladesh Bank set a high target of agriculture loan disbursement of about Tk 8,400 crore for the current fiscal year, 32 per cent more than the previous fiscal year, to help farmers recover crop losses.
   It also instructed the commercial banks to disburse most part (80 per cent) of the yearly loan target before the outgoing boro season. The banks, however, disbursed 76 per cent of the target.
   Different quarters, including government and Bangladesh Bank, projected bumper boro output this season, giving farmers the credit for their hard labour while the enhanced loans contributed to the farmers’ efforts.
   Nazrul Huda expected that almost 100 per cent of the disbursement target would be achieved by the end of the fiscal year as the trend shows, while the private commercial banks have already exceeded their agriculture loan disbursement target of Tk 1,300 crore.
   Inspired by the boro success, the central bank is considering administering agriculture credit in more organised manner from the next fiscal year. In the previous years, it took almost half of a fiscal year only to set the loan targets.
   The BB deputy governor said the agriculture loan is viable as well as profitable for the banks as the private commercial banks have shown recently. The recovery rate of agriculture loans provided by the private banks was also very good, he added.
   He expected that the private commercial banks would come forward in a bigger way to contribute to agriculture production as well as to earn profit.
   The central bank was also encouraging private banks to open more branches in the rural areas, he said.
   According to latest figures from Bangladesh Bank, the growth in agricultural credit disbursement increased substantially from 5.5 per cent in Q3 of FY07 to 73.1 per cent in Q3 of FY08, while total recovery recorded a growth of 44.2 per cent in Q3 of FY08 from 30.3 per cent over the same period in the previous fiscal.
   Total overdue as percentage of outstanding agricultural credit declined from 42.7 per cent in Q3 of FY07 to 36.0 per cent in Q3 of FY08 due to recent changes and movements in the credit market.

The United Arab Emirates, whose booming economy functions thanks to millions of foreign workers, has been urged to put a six-year cap on their residency, a local newspaper reported on Wednesday. The internal affairs and defence committee of the consultative Federal National Council, said the workers should leave the country after six years and only be allowed back after obtaining a new residency visa.
   The English-language Gulf News quoted the committee as saying this would allow the oil-rich country to circumvent obligations that might be imposed by international conventions regarding foreign manpower. The proposals made on Tuesday would require the approval of the cabinet and UAE president Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed al-Nayhan.
   The newspaper said official statistics put the number of foreign workers at 3.1 million, or 90 per cent of the private sector workforce, many of them from Asia.
   It is estimated the number of Emiratis will be less than eight percent of the workforce in 2009, a figure dropping to four per cent by 2020.
   Statistics recently published by the FNC, half of whose members are elected, put the UAE population at 5.6 million at the end of 2006, with only 15.4 per cent being citizens.

Business leaders Wednesday urged the government to make it clear how much of stock of food and other essentials will be considered as hoarding.
   They said the government should come up with a clear food policy so that the businessmen can remove their bad reputation as they are usually called as hoarders and profit-mongers.
   ‘We aren’t hoarders. The government will have to make it clear how much stock is hoarding. The country’s businesspeople don’t want to live under the spectre of fear,’ Annisul Huq, president of the Federation of Bangladesh Chamber and Industry, said.
   He was responding to a volley of questions from journalists after a closed-door meeting with Director General of Bangladesh Rifles Major General Shakil Ahmed at the FBCCI conference room.
   The meeting was held as the BDR DG came to address the launching ceremony of an FBCCI-sponsored price monitoring cell, which is likely to start work within the next four weeks.
   Talking about hoarding, the BDR DG said hoarding is a crime, but one thing should be made clear that stock is not hoarding. ‘If the stock of any food is made for trading, then it would not come under the ambit of hoarding.’
   The business leaders present during the open session expressed resentment over the government’s reported practice to call in the BDR high-ups and fix the prices of essentials, including edible oil.
   Fazlur Rahman, a leading whole-seller, said the government should not try to fix prices putting pressure on the businessmen as Bangladesh still has to depend on imports.
   The BDR DG suggested the government to revise the rice procurement policy as what he said small and marginal farmers cannot sell their rice to the government under the current procurement policy.
   ‘The small farmers should be allowed to sell their rice directly to the government procurement centres. If the government-fixed present rate for rice procurement do not benefit the farmers, then I suggest the government to revise its procurement policy immediately,’ he said.
   The BDR DG also warned that the price hike on the international market and the recent damage of crops in Myanmar by cyclone Nargis might have a negative impact on rice price in Bangladesh despite the bumper boro output.
   He laid emphasis on private-public partnership in tackling the overheated market saying that the government is a minor player when it comes to the market prices.
   Major Shakil described the present situation as alarming because 72-80 percent people have to spend 80 percent of their incomes on food purchase due to the price surge.
   Annisul Huq informed the journalists that their price monitoring cell will work under a taskforce.

MindShare is poised to restructure its operations globally and integrated its traditional and digital units as part of efforts to reinvent the GroupM agency as a full-service marketing business.
   The overhaul will result in one P&L and will see 12 separate agency units and disciplines transferred into four new divisions: client leadership (two teams serving as client and operation leaders), business planning (go-to-market strategy), invention (creative development), and exchange (media planning and trading), said a press release.
   The agency’s interaction unit will also be dissolved, with all functions and staff moving into the core organisation.
   Ashutosh Sri-Vastava, MindShare chief executive officer, Asia-Pacific, said the leaders for each of the functions and clients will he announced at the agency’s regional meeting in Bali this week.
   Country heads from China, India, Bangladesh, Japan, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia and Australia will implement changes over the next three to six months, the press release added.

Bangladeshi ad agency Benchmark Limited teamed up with TBWA\Worldwide for mobilising international expertise in building better brands in Bangladesh.
   The partnership was made up at a function held the Sonargaon Hotel in the Dhaka city on Tuesday, said a press release.
   Ashraf Kaiser, chief executive officer of Benchmark, and Ian Thubron, executive vice-president of TBWA\Asia Pacific, unveiled the new logo of the company ‘TBWA\Benchmark’ in presence of the media, business personalities and social celebrities.
   Ian officially handed over the ‘Symbol of Disruption’ and presented the working philosophy of TBWA\.
   ‘We are looking forward to a fruitful partnership and to bring in TBWA\’s philosophy of Disruption in Bangladesh, their resources and insight’ said Ashraf.
   Ian Thubron, said, ‘The association with Benchmark will help TBWA\ to mobilise its international expertise in building better brands in Bangladesh.’

World oil prices neared record levels close to 122 dollars per barrel on Wednesday as traders awaited a crucial weekly update on American energy reserves amid concern about tight global supplies.
   New York’s main oil futures contract, light sweet crude for June delivery, eased ten cents to 121.74 dollars, after hitting a lifetime peak of 122.73 dollars on Tuesday.
   The price of London’s Brent North Sea crude for June delivery gained seven cents to 120.38 dollars. The contract had struck a historic pinnacle of 120.99 on Tuesday.
   Runaway oil prices have almost doubled in the past year and have surged by more than 20 dollars since the beginning of 2008.
   The market was also boosted this week after Goldman Sachs forecast that prices could strike 200 dollars per barrel within the next two years. The US investment bank had famously and correctly predicted three years ago that oil would break through 100 dollars — which it did in January.
   ‘Crude oil prices were trading on Wednesday around 122 dollars, with the weekly EIA data out later today keeping the market on edge,’ said Sucden analyst Michael Davies.
   The US government’s Energy Information Administration was due later Wednesday to reveal the state of American energy inventories for the week ending May 2. Ongoing violence in Nigeria — Africa’s largest crude producer — had helped push oil prices to record peaks on Tuesday, traders said.
   ‘Support stemmed from continued unrest in Nigeria where a string of attacks by rebels calling for a greater share of the country’s oil wealth have shut-in a sizeable element of its production,’ said analysts at energy consultancy John Hall Associates.
   ‘Concerns over further Turkish incursion into Iraq in pursuit of Kurdish separatists also underpinned price movements.’
   Nigerian militants attacked an oil ship off the coast of the west African country and took two people hostage over the weekend, a military spokesman said Sunday.
   The incident on Saturday came after an attack on Shell oil wells and a flow station in southern Bayelsa state, leading to a cut in the company’s output.
   Such attacks have cut Nigeria’s production by about a quarter over the past two years.
   David Moore, a commodity strategist at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia in Sydney, said sentiment remained buoyant after Tuesday’s sharp gains.
   ‘While issues on the supply side are being progressively resolved... they highlight the risks of oil production going forward,’ said Moore.
   He added that ‘Iran may also add a little risk element’ in the near term.
   Iran said Monday it would reject any offer that violates its right to the full nuclear fuel cycle after world powers said they had prepared a new package to end a long-running standoff over its nuclear programme.

The dollar climbed against the euro and yen on Wednesday, supported by hopes that the worst of the credit crunch is over, and on the eve of a rate decision by the European Central Bank, dealers said.
   Elsewhere, the European Commission on Wednesday gave Slovakia the green light to adopt the euro, setting the ex-communist country on a path to become next January the 16th eurozone country.
   In European trade, the euro fell to 1.5470 dollars from 1.5530 in New York late on Tuesday.
   The dollar gained to 105.28 yen from 104.75.
   The US currency was ‘supported by market optimism that the credit crunch is starting to ease to some extent,’ said Kenichi Yumoto at Societe Generale.
   US mortgage finance giant Fannie Mae reported on Tuesday a net loss of 2.19 billion dollars and announced plans to raise fresh capital, but executives also voiced hopes of an easing of the credit crunch.
   The dollar’s gains were capped by jitters about crude oil prices, which hit a new record high at 122.73 dollars per barrel on Tuesday.
   The British pound was also in focus ahead of an interest rate decision from the Bank of England on Thursday, although no policy change is expected given inflation concerns.
   The BoE was expected to hold borrowing costs at 5.00 per cent while the ECB is set to keep eurozone rates at 4.00 per cent, according to economists.
   Ahead of the ECB decision, official data released on Wednesday showed consumers in the 15 nations sharing the euro had reined in spending during March, confounding expectations that they would keep their wallets wide open despite a weakening economy.
   The volume of retail trade in the eurozone fell O.4 per cent in March from February and slumped 1.6 per cent over 12 months, the European Union’s Eurostat data agency said.
   ‘Although consumer confidence has softened lately it remains much stronger than in the US or the UK,’ said Capital Economics analyst Jennifer McKeown.

ADB to provide $500m to combat food crisis
The Asian Development Bank will provide 500 million dollars in immediate assistance to member nations hit hardest by soaring food prices, the head of the bank announced Tuesday. ADB president Haruhiko Kuroda said the bank would also double lending for agriculture in 2009 to 2.0 billion dollars to combat the crisis, which he has warned puts more than a billion people in the region at risk of malnutrition. ‘I am pleased to announce that ADB will provide 500 million dollars as immediate budgetary support to the hardest hit countries so that they can bring food to the tables of the vulnerable, poor and needy,’ he said. ‘This money will be made available to cushion the impact of rising fiscal burden due to rising food prices,’ Kuroda told a news conference at the end of a four-day annual meeting of the bank in Madrid. ‘We will also double our lending to Agricultural and Natural Resources, including rural infrastructure, to over 2.0 billion dollars over the next one year.’ In 2008, the ADB plans to lend one billion dollars to the sector. The countries that received the aid would be announced later, he added. ‘A few countries requested and showed some interest in getting such kind of immediate support,’ the Japanese national said. ‘We are engaged in discussions. In coming weeks we will be able to agree on terms and conditions and will be able to release the names of the countries and the amounts of assistance to each country.’ Kuroda has warned that the food problem could cut into decades of economic gains in the Asia-Pacific region, home to two-thirds of the world’s poor and where spending on food accounts for 60 percent of total average expenditure. Japanese finance minister Fukushiro Nukaga has warned the crisis could provoke social unrest in the region. Prices for the benchmark Thai variety of rice, a food staple across much of Asia, are at about 1,000 dollars a tonne, up threefold from the last ADB annual meeting held in Japan one year ago. Kuroda has blamed the crisis on reduced supplies and increased demand, along with the sharp depreciation of the US dollar and trade restrictions by some countries. On the eve of the conference, donors pledged 11.3 billion dollars by 2012 to help the bank tackle poverty and the food crisis, a 60 per cent increase over the previous four-year period.
— AFP