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The chief adviser, Fakhruddin Ahmed, on Monday inaugurated automation of Chittagong Customs House at Bangladesh-China Friendship Conference Centre in the capital.
   At a ceremony, he said an environment friendly to commerce, industries and agriculture was building up in the country thanks to the initiatives of his interim administration.
   He described the businesspeople and industrialists as the drivers of the economy, and urged them to make the best of the business-friendly environment, build industries and create employment.
   ‘The present government has taken initiative for macro-economic and infrastructural reforms including formulation of proper planning to survive in the competitive world market and achieve economic stability.
   ‘Better Business Forum and Regulatory Reforms Commission have been formed as parts of it. Information of reduction in cost of initiating business in Bangladesh mentioned in the UNCTAD report is a reflection of it,’ Fakhruddin said.
   Fakhruddin said the caretaker government had freed Chittagong Port, the lifeline of the trade and commerce of the country, from irregularities and corruption.
   ‘Chittagong Customs House is an integral part of the activities of Chittagong Port. Earlier one had to move to 42 points for loading or unloading goods in the customs house. As a result, the importers and exports would face harassment and loss… I am very happy to be able to inaugurate the automation project of Chittagong Customs House.’
   He said introduction of the most modern system of taxation with the initiative of Chittagong Chamber of Commerce and Industry under intensive supervision of the army is a unique example of development activities under government-private partnership.
   The interim government head spoke of reforms in other areas in his speech.
   ‘After assuming power we fixed one of our targets as to establish democratic system on a solid foundation and ensure good governance and transparency at all levels.
   ‘For that we are continuing massive institutional reforms. The Election Commission has been reformed as a part of it. An ordinance has been promulgated to establish an independent Election Commission Secretariat.
   ‘The reconstituted Election Commission has already prepared list of more than eight crore voters with photographs in only 11 months with the assistance of the army.
   ‘The Election Commission has proved its efficiency by successfully holding elections to four city corporations and nine municipalities. Now they are making all-out preparation for the Jatiya Sangsad and upazila elections.’
   ‘Besides, the reformed Anti-Corruption Commission has taken effective steps as part of the institutional reform. The commission has already brought a good number of persons to trial.
   ‘The Public Service Commission is now working independently. Unwanted interference and irregularities and corruption in public appointments have been completely stopped. The way to rule of law has been cleared by separating judiciary from the executive branch.
   Right to Information Ordinance has been formulated. National Human Rights Commission Ordinance has been approved for establishing human rights in the country and a National Human Rights Commission would soon be formed.
   Finance and planning adviser AB Mirza Azizul Islam, commerce adviser Hossain Zillur Rahman, army chief General Moeen U Ahmed, National Board of Revenue chairman Mohammad Abdul Majid, CCCI president Saifuzzaman Chowdhury Javed and Chittagong area commander Major General Mohammad Shamim Chowdhury were among others present at the inauguration ceremony.

Dhaka stocks plunged on Monday due to profit taking selling pressure from investors after a bull run before the nine-day vacation, said market operators.
   The Dhaka Stock Exchange and the Chittagong Stock Exchange returned to trading on Sunday after the closure that began on September 26 on the occasion of Shab-e-Qadr and Eid-ul-Fitr as well as weekly holidays.
   A DSE stock broker said investors locked in profit taking after rises in shares prices. He, however, said turnover at the bourse rose due to strong participation of investors.
   The DSE general index lost 73 points or 2.43 per cent to close at 2928.38, while its blue chips index, DSE20, shed 50.92 points, or 2.05 per cent, to finish at 2435.59.
   Of the total 230 issues traded at the DSE, 65 advanced, 159 declined and six remained unchanged.
   Turnover at the DSE increased to Tk 511.54 crore from the Sunday’s Tk 450.47 crore.
   Beximco Pharmaceuticals topped the turnover leaders with a total transaction of Tk 47.88 crore.
   LankaBangla Finance, Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company, ACI Ltd, Beximco, S Alam Cold Rolled Steels, Summit Power, Grameen Two Mutual Fund, Union Capital and Keya Cosmetics were the remaining nine turnover leader.
   The CSE selective categories index lost 137.97 points or 2.31 per cent to close at 5825.48 while its blue chips index, CSE30, shed 178.02 points, or 2.25 per cent, to finish at 7732.96.
   Of the total 144 issues traded at the CSE, 32 posted gain, 111 dropped and one remained unchanged.
   Turnover at the CSE went up to Tk 84.08 crore from the Sunday’s Tk 61.67 crore.

Crude oil prices slumped to eight month low points below 90 dollars a barrel on Monday as worsening financial turmoil triggered fears about slowing demand for energy, traders said.
   Prices have slumped almost 40 per cent in three months since they struck record highs of above 147 dollars in July.
   Brent North Sea crude for delivery in November tumbled 3.54 dollars to 86.71 dollars a barrel in electronic deals.
   New York’s main contract, light sweet crude for November, shed 3.96 dollars to 89.92 dollars a barrel.
   ‘The drops are down to concerns about growth in the world economy,’ said Damien Cox, senior energy analyst at John Hall Associates.
   ‘There is a lot of concern what the impact of a slowdown will have on demand in the US, Europe and elsewhere.’
   Since striking their record highs, oil prices have fallen sharply on concerns that demand is slowing during the global financial crisis.
   ‘A feature of ongoing tensions in the financial sector and increased concerns over the real economy impact is yet further sharp falls in the oil price,’ said Nick Matthews, an analyst at Barclays Capital in London.
   On Sunday, French bank BNP Paribas announced it was taking control of ailing finance group Fortis’ operations in Belgium and Luxembourg, in a deal that would make Belgium the largest shareholder in the French bank.
   Germany also sealed a public-private rescue plan for the country’s fourth biggest bank Hypo Real Estate as the government extended a blanket guarantee for all personal bank deposits to avert panic withdrawals.
   The announcements came on the eve of a meeting of European finance ministers in Luxembourg. They were due on Monday to flesh out broad plans for restoring confidence in the crisis-struck banking system, agreed to over the weekend by Europe’s biggest economic powers.
   ‘The risks of a severe international economic slowdown, possibly extending to a recession in some developed economies, have increased as a result of the recent strains in the international financial system,’ said David Moore, a commodity strategist with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia in Sydney.
   ‘If there is a severe downturn in the international economy, oil prices could prove weaker than forecast,’ he said.
   The oil market was also following developments in Nigeria, a major exporter of crude.
   Militants behind a recent ‘oil war’ in the country’s Delta region freed on Sunday 19 local hostages but said they were detaining two Britons and a Ukrainian ‘for security reasons.’
   The rebels belong to the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, which since its emergence in early 2006 has multiplied attacks, kidnappings of foreign oil workers and sabotage at oil installations on land and offshore.
   It has caused Nigeria to lose one quarter of its oil production, recently ceding its place as the biggest crude oil producer in Africa to Angola.

The council of advisers’ committee on economic affairs on Monday authorised the Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation to sign an agreement with a Malaysian state-owned company for petroleum import, putting aside the compulsion of state-to-state agreements.
   The decision will now help the corporation to sign the contact with Malaysia’s Petronas Trading Corporation to import 9 lakh tonnes of refined petroleum, the finance and planning adviser, AB Mirza Azizul, Islam told reporters after the committee meeting at the planning ministry.
   The corporation imports around 38 lakh tonnes of refined and crude fuel oils a year from state-run companies of various countries including Kuwait, Saudi Arab and the United Arab Emirates under state-to-state agreements.
   The corporation decided to import 9 lakh tonnes of refined oils such as diesel, kerosene and jet fuel from Petronas to reduce dependency on the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation, from which the corporation imports 70 per cent of the total refined petroleum.
   The committee on Monday also approved proposals for selling out three state-owned enterprises to the highest bidders.
   The enterprises are the Satrong Textile Mills for Tk 17.33 crore, the Karnaphuli Rayon and Chemical Industry for Tk 51.11 crore and the Particle Board and Billiard for Tk 26 crore 53 lakh and 54 thousand.
   The commerce adviser, Hossain Zillur Rahman, the law adviser, Hassan Ariff, the chief adviser’s special assistant M Tamim and secretaries to the ministries concerned attended the meeting.

World markets suffered massive losses Monday, striking four-year lows, as panic-stricken investors doubted whether a Wall Street bailout package would stem the global financial crisis.
   London, Frankfurt and Paris all tumbled more than six per cent approaching the half-way mark while a 15-per cent dive in Moscow forced a halt to Russian trading.
   ‘We have a seriously weak and fear driven market at our hands,’ said Tom Hougaard, chief market strategist at City Index.
   ‘It is anyone’s guess where we will end the day.’
   Investors dumped shares after US stock markets had fallen sharply on Friday, despite US congressional approval of a 700 billion dollars bank bailout.
   On Monday, Tokyo ended down 4.25 per cent as Hong Kong’s stock market shed 5.0 per cent, Seoul tumbled 4.3 per cent and Sydney lost 3.3 per cent. Shanghai dived 5.23 per cent and Mumbai was down 5.58 per cent in late afternoon trade.
   European stocks plummeted after Germany’s fourth biggest bank had to be rescued over the weekend — news that pushed the euro to a 13-month low against the dollar on Monday.
   Crude oil futures tumbled to eight-month lows below 90 dollars a barrel in London and New York as worsening financial turmoil triggered fears about slowing demand for energy.
   ‘The market is not convinced that the US bailout package can protect the economy from the financial crisis,’ said Toyo Securities strategist Ryuta Otsuka.
   The Saudi stock market, the largest in the Arab world, shed 9.6 per cent at the opening on Monday after a week-long holiday, and shares in other energy-rich Gulf states also slumped.
   ‘The Fed’s bailout plan may have been passed on Friday but so far there’s been no real reaction in credit markets and because of this the natural assumption is going to be that the measures won’t work, even if such a call is rather premature,’ CMC Markets dealer Matt Buckland added.
   Underscoring the worsening conditions in the United States, the world’s largest economy, 159,000 US jobs were lost in September, according to government figures published Friday.
   ‘The approval of the financial rescue plan failed to bolster market confidence. Pessimism towards the global economy is running deeper,’ said Young Wang, an analyst at Yuanta Securities Investment Consulting in Taipei, where stocks ended down 4.1 per cent, also at a four-year low.
   As the US-born financial crisis takes a stronger grip in Europe, the German government agreed an emergency rescue package of 50 billion euros, or 68 billion dollars, for Hypo Real Estate, late Sunday before markets opened in Asia.
   It also announced an unlimited guarantee for personal savings deposits.
   France’s BNP Paribas meanwhile announced Sunday that it was taking control of the operations of ailing financial group Fortis in Belgium and Luxembourg.
   The leaders of France, Germany, Italy and Britain vowed over the weekend to protect fragile banks but did not discuss a European financial rescue package.
   ‘Financial stocks are certainly going to be under pressure again with German mortgage lender Hypo Real Estate being the latest to receive state aid but the overall impact is going to cross all sectors with the prospect of slowing demand weighing on all the (company) heavyweights,’ added Buckland.
   In an effort to keep credit flowing, global central banks pumped billions of extra dollars into short-term lending markets in what has become a daily effort to keep cash moving in a critical network.
   Markets were looking ahead to a meeting Friday of finance chiefs from the Group of Seven rich nations, waiting for any announcements on coordinated action such as liquidity injections or interest rate cuts, dealers said.
   A speech Tuesday by US Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke would also be closely watched for any clues on the possibility of a US interest rate cut.
   The Bank of England was expected to cut British borrowing costs by at least a quarter of a per centage point when it meets on Thursday.

South Korean president Lee Myung-Bak Monday proposed holding a summit with his Chinese and Japanese counterparts to discuss ways to calm the global financial turmoil, his ruling party said.
   Lee will make the formal offer when he attends the Asia-Europe Meeting in Beijing on October 24-25, said Cha Myung-Jin, spokesman for the ruling Grand National Party.
   ‘East Asia now has the world’s largest amount of foreign currency in reserve,’ Lee was quoted as telling party chief Park Hee-Tae, according to the spokesman who attended their meeting.
   Lee said it would be ‘a good idea’ for South Korean, Chinese and Japanese leaders to hold a regional summit on the financial crisis, the spokesman said.
   ‘The three countries can wisely overcome the financial crisis if they join forces,’ the president was quoted as saying.
   Japan said it supported holding economic talks at ASEM, but added it had not yet made a final decision on whether newly installed Prime Minister Taro Aso would attend.
   ‘Economic issues will be in focus at ASEM,’ chief government spokesman Takeo Kawamura told reporters in Tokyo in response to Lee’s proposal.
   ‘At issue will be how each country can cooperate with others in dealing with worries over the financial crisis and how Japan can play a leadership role as one of the world’s major economies,’ he said.
   Japan had initially planned to host a three-way summit with China and South Korea in September, but put it off due to political turmoil in Tokyo.
   Lee on Friday called for finance ministers of the three countries to discuss closer coordination. He warned that the US-born financial crisis was showing signs of spreading globally and depressing the world’s real economy.
   Seoul officials said earlier the three countries will discuss speeding up the creation of an 80 billion dollar fund to help protect Asia.
   The Strategy and Finance Ministry said deputy finance ministers from South Korea, China and Japan will meet
   next Monday on the sidelines of the International Monetary Fund’s annual meeting in Washington.
   Their finance ministers met in May and agreed to upgrade a currency swap scheme.
   They were supposed to meet again in May next year to discuss details.
   But the vice-ministers will discuss bringing forward the ministerial talks.

The euro fell to a 13-month low point of 1.3543 dollars on Monday as the deepening crisis in Europe’s banking sector dominated trade in the foreign exchange market, dealers said.
   The euro took a beating after Germany’s number four bank, Hypo Real Estate, had to be rescued on Sunday.
   In late morning trade in London, the European single currency pulled back slightly to stand at 1.3586 dollars, compared to 1.3781 dollars in New York late on Friday.
   After the US Congress finally passed a Wall Street bailout bill, traders’ attention was firmly focused on the problems among European banks.
   ‘The deepening banking crisis in the eurozone keeps the euro under selling pressure not only versus the dollar but also versus sterling and the yen,” said Dresdner Kleinwort analyst Michael Klawitter.’
   ‘Market participants remain concerned about domino effects in the banking system.’
   The leaders of France, Germany, Italy and Britain vowed over the weekend to protect fragile banks but did not discuss a European financial rescue package.
   Meanwhile on Monday, the yen traded close to a five-month high against the dollar and surged against a range of currencies as investors rushed to exit risky positions amid fresh market turmoil.
   Against the Japanese currency, the dollar dipped to 103.37 yen from 105.27 late on Friday.
   ‘The foreign exchange markets are highly volatile as risk aversion lurched higher on the news that the German government had to step in to save Hypo Real Estate from collapse over the weekend,’ said Derek Halpenny, European head of global currency research at The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi.
   ‘Furthermore, there was little concrete agreed at the weekend summit of European leaders underlining investors’ concerns that there is no mechanism in place for a Europe-wide approach to a banking crisis.’
   The yen tends to do well in times of financial turbulence as speculators unwind risky trades funded with cheap Japanese credit. Japan has also so far escaped financial turmoil on the scale seen in the United States and Europe.
   Markets also were looking ahead to a meeting Friday of finance chiefs from the Group of Seven rich nations amid speculation they could announce coordinated action to try to contain the growing financial mayhem.
   Elsewhere on Monday, the British pound sank against the dollar as dealers priced in a likely interest rate cut from the Bank of England this week.
   The British central bank was expected to deliver either a quarter or a half-point reduction on Thursday, which would take the benchmark interest rate to 4.75 or 4.50 per cent.
   In London morning trade on Monday, the euro changed hands at 1.3586 dollars against 1.3781 late Friday, at 140.43 yen (145.16), 0.7707 pounds (0.7775) and 1.5517 Swiss francs (1.5557).
   The dollar stood at 103.37 yen (105.27) and 1.1424 Swiss francs (1.1287).
   The pound was at 1.7570 dollars (1.7722).
   On the London Bullion Market, the price of gold rose to 834.95 dollars an ounce from 828 dollars late Friday.

Net Asset Value
   ICB 2nd NRB
   On the close of operation on September 25, 2008, the fund has reported net asset value of Tk 107.71 per share on the basis of current market price and Tk 102.94 on the basis of cost price against face value of Tk 100.
   
   ICB Islamic
   On the close of operation on September 25, 2008, the fund has reported NAV of Tk 209.95 per share on the basis of current market price and Tk 148.90 on the basis of cost price against face value of Tk 100.
   
   ICB 1st NRB
   On the close of operation on September 25, 2008, the fund has reported NAV of Tk 202.39 per share on the basis of current market price and Tk 154.79 on the basis of cost price against face value of Tk 100.
   
   ICB AMCL 1st
   On the close of operation on September 25, 2008, the fund has reported NAV of Tk 281.85 per share on the basis of current market price and Tk 194.78 on the basis of cost price against face value of Tk. 100.
   
   Profit
   Fu Wang Food
   As per audited accounts as on June 30, 2008, the company has reported profit after tax of Tk 1.41 crore with earning per share of Tk 0.77 as against Tk 1.30 crore and Tk 0.70 respectively as on June 30, 2007.
   
   Response to DSE query
   Rangpur Foundry
   In response to a DSE query, the company has informed that there is no undisclosed price sensitive information of the company for recent unusual price hike.
   
   Dafodil Computers
   In response to a DSE query, the company has informed that there is no undisclosed price sensitive information of the company for recent unusual price hike.
   
   Monno Fabrics
   In response to a DSE query, the company has informed that there is no undisclosed price sensitive information of the company for recent unusual price hike.
   Source: DSE

Singapore, Malaysia expand air services deal
Singapore and Malaysia expanded the bilateral air agreement on Monday, allowing both countries’ low cost carriers to increase services. ‘The new agreement gives low cost carriers of both countries the right to operate between Singapore and three cities in East Malaysia - Kota Kinabalu, Kuching and Miri,’ said Singapore’s Ministry of Transport in a statement. It said that from November 1, Singapore low cost carriers will be allowed to operate a total of seven flights a week to each of the above cities, and these will be later increased to 14 flights to each city from March 1. The same entitlements have been granted to the low cost carriers of Malaysia, said the statement.
— Xinhua

Banque Populaire, Caisse d’Epargne in merger talks
Banque Populaire and Caisse d’Epargne — two of the largest high street banks in France — have begun talks on a possible merger, a source close to the talks said Monday. Only the ‘central organisations’ of the two mutual banks would be joined, with the retail banking networks remaining separate, the source said, adding that President Nicolas Sarkozy’s office had been informed of the talks. The source said rival France bank BNP Paribas’s plan to take control of the ailing finance group Fortis’s operations in Belgium and Luxembourg, had ‘accelerated’ the merger plans.
— AFP

Nomura to buy Lehman’s Indian IT operations
Japan’s top broker Nomura Holdings said Monday that it had agreed to acquire Lehman Brothers’ IT support operations in India, giving jobs to 3,000 more workers from the bankrupt Wall Street giant. Nomura, which is already buying Lehman’s operations in the Asia-Pacific, the Middle East and Europe, will take on the failed US bank’s India-based back office and IT support businesses for an undisclosed sum. The Japanese broker moved swiftly to buy up Lehman’s operations in Europe and Asia after the once-mighty Wall Street titan was brought down by the financial crisis that has rocked world markets. But the Indian subsidiaries, based in the financial hub of Mumbai, were not included in the earlier deal because they were under the wing of Lehman’s North American business, which is being bought by the British bank Barclays.
— AFP