KSE to remove ‘floor’ on 27th: Dawn

By Dilawar Hussain
KARACHI, Oct 14: The Board of directors of the Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) decided on Tuesday to remove the ‘floor’ from under the KSE-100 index on Oct 27.“Normal trading parameters of 5 per cent upper and lower circuit breakers will be imposed from that day onwards,” a spokesman for the bourse said.The KSE had fixed a ‘floor’ under the index at the 9,144 points level on Aug 27 to prevent a further fall, after a fearful plunge in equity values by 41 per cent in less than four months. The measure had brought the market to a virtual halt with volume of shares traded at 11-year low on Tuesday, at just over half a million shares.The Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP), Raziur Rehman, told Dawn that the ‘floor mechanism’ had been put in place to give the market a ‘breathing space’. He expressed the hope that as the world equity markets were heading towards stability, the KSE would be able to absorb the shock, if any, from soft landing.Incidentally, the announcement of ‘floor’ removal coincided with the arrival of Prime Minister’s Adviser on Finance Shaukat Tareen, who had expressed his disapproval of the ‘floor’ and turned down a request for closure of the market.Analysts were worried over a possible 20 per cent drop in the index in the first week after the planks are pulled from under the ‘floor’. The big scare was the foreigners’ selling, who still held $2 billion in equities.The KSE spokesman said the board had discussed with the finance ministry, SECP, SBP and other stakeholders three critical areas of liquidity; risk management and restoring investor confidence. It said the ministry and the SECP would “implement full set of stabilisation measures prior to Oct 27”.

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Pakistan Venture Capital Association of Europe launched: APP

LONDON, June 13, (APP)-The Pakistan Venture Capital Association of Europe (PVCAE) has been established as a European based trade association representing the interests of European investors look to invest in the venture capital and private equity markets in Pakistan.

A function in this regard was arranged on Thursday evening in the financial district of the city in which experts threw light on the various aspects of investment opportunities in Pakistan.

Explaining the objectives of the PVCAE, Shaistah Akhtar of SJ Berwin Lending and Leasing Partner, said these are to provide potential investors with the essential market information required to make informed investor decisions, and a platform for networking and sharing knowledge and experiences, as well as a conduit through which to relay to the Pakistan Government and regulatory authorities specifically the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan, the views and concerns of European investors in relation to policy making. The founder members of PVCAE include Nomura, JS Group, Royal Bank of Scotland, Coller Capital, Ithmar Capital and Hamilton Bradshaw. The PVCAE is managed by SJ Berwin , an International law firm and the Commonwealth Business Council. The two keynote speakers Moeen Khawaja, Director, Business Development at JS Group, and Sadeq Sayeed, Special Advisor, spoke of their experiences and noted that Pakistan though currently is passing through a difficult phase, but nevertheless it is a country that made rapid economic growth with its real GDP over 7 percent for the last 4 years..

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