SME board investors can trade shares on block market from 21 May

Investors of the small and medium enterprise (SME) companies can trade shares on the block market from 21 May, according to the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE).

In a block market, buyers and sellers set a price in advance and then trade shares in this market. But shares cannot be bought or sold for less than Tk5 lakh here.

Initially, in order to be considered eligible for trading shares in the Small Capital Platform launched in 2021, there was an obligation to invest at least Tk1 crore in the shares of listed companies.

Eligible investors had to fill in a number of forms in order to trade on this platform.

Because of a capital crunch and a low number of investors, the platform had not gained much popularity. Therefore, the process of trading shares on the Small Capital Platform was later made simple, and the minimum investment requirement was halved.

But, as the investors did not show much interest even after those measures, the minimum investment was further reduced to Tk20 lakh.

At present, 15 companies are listed on the SME platform.

DSMEX, the SME board index of the DSE, surged by 41 points to reach 1,057 on Tuesday, compared to the previous trading session.

On the day, the turnover value was Tk4.75 crore, which was 21% higher than the previous session.

During the trading session, 11 issues advanced and 3 declined.