Business

Scheduled banks in October further cut rates of interest on their deposit products due to rising excess liquidity in the banking sector amid lower loan disbursement in the industrial sector, according to the Bangladesh Bank data released last week. The weighted average interest rate on deposit in the banking sector declined to 7.40 percentage points in ... Read more

The implementation of annual development programme hit six-year low at 13 per cent in the first four months of the current fiscal year mainly because of low progress in large projects. Planning ministry officials said that ministries with higher ADP allocations failed to make any progress in large projects in July-October resulting in worst

Four state-owned commercial banks — Sonali, Janata, Agrani and Rupali — recovered only Tk 226 crore, or 36.27 per cent of their annual target of Tk 623 crore, from their top 20 loan defaulters in the first nine months of 2014, the latest Bangladesh Bank data showed. The four banks were on the verge of ... Read more

Sends summary on the proposal to finance minister The National Board of Revenue is against a commerce ministry proposal for collecting value-added tax on edible oil at only one stage of supply chain of the product instead of the existing multi-level VAT collection system, officials said. Apparently, the proposed system is easier for collection of VAT ... Read more

The government on Wednesday inked a deal with Sri Lanka for exporting 25,000 tonnes of coarse rice at a price of US$ 450 per tonne to the South Asian nation in its first ever move to sell the staple food grain abroad. The directorate general of the directorate of food, Sarwar Khan, and chairman of Lanka Sathosa ... Read more

Bangladesh Bank governor Atiur Rahman on Wednesday asked the senior officials of the central bank’s inspection- and supervision-related departments to take immediate measures to curb the increased trend in the defaulted loans in the banking sector. The BB governor made the directive at an internal meeting held at the central bank headquarters in the capital while

Trading of shares of Hamid Fabrics Limited begins at the Dhaka and Chittagong stock exchanges today after completion of initial public offering process. The trading and company codes of the company will be ‘HFL’ and 17464 at the Dhaka bourse, said the DSE in a web post published on Wednesday. The Bangladesh

Dhaka stocks advanced for the third trading session on Wednesday with an increased turnover as retail investors, encouraged by a bigger participation of institutional investors on the trading floor, went for buying shares. Since Monday institutional investors increased their participation focusing on large capitalised companies scrips ahead of the year closing of the entities.

Dhaka stocks advanced for the third trading session on Wednesday with an increased turnover as retail investors, encouraged by a bigger participation of institutional investors on the trading floor, went for buying shares. Since Monday institutional investors increased their participation focusing on large capitalised companies scrips ahead of the year closing of

The country’s inward remittance increased by 11.42 per cent to $6.19 billion in the first five months of the current financial year 2014-15 from $5.56 billion in the corresponding period of the FY14. Bangladesh Bank officials attributed the increase to expatriate Bangladeshis’ sending of significant amount of foreign exchange on the occasions of Eid-ul-Fitr and Eid-ul-Azha ... Read more

European Union will establish a business council in Bangladesh in a bid to expand and strengthen economic and trade relations between the country and the region, EU ambassador and head of EU delegation to Bangladesh Pierre Mayaudon told reporters on Tuesday. After a view exchange meeting with commerce minister

A gender expert on Tuesday said that sexual violence free work environment is often overlooked in the readymade garment sector in Bangladesh although factory compliances focused more on occupational health and hazards. ‘Bangladesh is still ranked 129 out of 169 countries in the gender inequity index… Women labour force participation rate is among the lowest

An advertising campaign for Coca-Cola’s new high-end milk has drawn huge criticism on charge of apparent ‘sexism’, reports Daily Mail. Featuring pictures of naked women dripping in barely-there dresses made of milk, Fairlife is being launched to much fanfare this month in the United States. The photographs, which appear to be working under the logic

Commerce minister Tofail Ahmed on Tuesday came down heavily on the Centre for Policy Dialogue for its latest statement in which CPD distinguished fellow Debapriya Bhattacharya had said that Bangladesh needed at least 10 more years for coming out from the list of least developed countries. At a press briefing at his secretariat office, he severely ... Read more

Dhaka stocks surged for the second trading session on Tuesday with investors focusing on large capitalised companies’ scrips amid institutional investors’ increased participation at the trading floor ahead of the year closing of the entities. The key index of Dhaka Stock Exchange, DSEX, increased to 4,932.89 points, adding 1.31 per cent or 64.24 points. Large capitalised

Only 8.35 lakh people paid income tax by Nov 30 deadline The National Board of Revenue found the number of individual income taxpayers for the current fiscal year totally unsatisfactory, officials said. They said there was virtually no growth in the number of income tax returns submitted by the taxpayers by the deadline that ended on ... Read more

Central bank to introduce software to check money laundering Bangladesh Bank is going to take strict regulations for currency exchange firms from this month to check money laundering, said officials of the central bank. The BB will introduce a software in this regard and will initially operate it on test-run basis by this month. After ... Read more

Bangladesh should increase its bilateral and regional cooperation activities in the East Asian countries as the Western countries were not keeping their promises, commerce minister Tofail Ahmed said on Monday. ‘Those who are vocal about our labour rights and workers’ safety, they are not giving us tariff-free facilities which would help the country and our workers. ... Read more

2G Spectrum Charge BTRC must pay Tk 269cr VAT of 4 telcos, decides NBR The National Board of Revenue has decided that Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission would have to pay Tk 269.17 crore in value-added tax on the third instalment of spectrum charge paid by four mobile phone operators to the telecom regulator for renewal ... Read more

Allege garment factory owners but Alliance, Accord deny Garment factory owners have alleged that in the name of ensuring fire and structural safety in the country’s apparel units the two platforms of North American and European buyers — Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety and Accord on Fire and Building Safety — are promoting certain vendors ... Read more