The Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) has recently released a report. According to the report, the investment in February was Tk 23,000 crore in line with the market price. In other words, the investment of the country’s banks in the capital market has decreased by 4.39 percent in one month.

On the other hand, the banks’ exposure to the stock market was a total of Rs 14,000 crore. Which is 8.23 percent less than the market price during this period. As on March 10, the banks had a capital of Rs 8,601 crore, up from Rs 72,129 crore at the end of February. In 2021, 40 banks made a profit of Rs 7 crore by investing in the stock market, and two banks faced losses.

According to the report, IFIC Bank has made the highest profit of the year from the stock market.

42 banks have invested Tk 808 crore through their own portfolios, while their affiliates have lent Tk 498 crore. It has invested Rs 950 crore in listed permanent bonds and Rs 1648 crore in mutual funds.

According to the report, the cash in the BO accounts of the banks at this time was Tk 313 crore.

The share market exposure of Bengal Commercial Bank, Dutch Bangla Bank, Meghna Bank and Seemant Bank is below 10 percent. At the same time, five banks – Citizen Bank, Habib Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, State Bank of India and Uri Bank – have no market share.

In 2021, all the banks together have created a fund of Tk 431 crore against the investment in the stock market.

On March 9 this year, the BSEC sought the latest position of banks’ exposure to the stock market and asked all banks to make new investments to support the declining stock market.

Banks that have market exposure below 25 per cent have been directed to increase their exposure by 2 per cent through new investments. And to speed up the process of raising funds and investing in the market, banks that have not yet formed special funds have been instructed to do so.

On March 9, 2020, banks were allowed to set up a special fund of Tk 200 crore with soft loans from the central bank to invest in the stock market. The fund will be valid till February 2025 and the banks will be able to avail the loan till January 13, 2025, the report said.