Photo : Collected
The Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday put business restrictions on two brokerage houses — Dhanmondi Securities Limited and PFI Securities Limited — due to a shortage in their consolidated customer accounts.
Consolidated accounts are accounts drawn up to reflect the affairs of a group of entities.
The directive stated that the commission sent a letter to the Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit to freeze the bank accounts, and instructed the Central Depository Bangladesh Limited to freeze the beneficiary owners’ accounts of the board of directors and the managing director of Dhanmondi Securities Limited and PFI Securities Limited.
The commission also sent a letter of request to the Special Branch of police asking to ban these persons from travelling abroad.
The directive also said that the stock market regulatory authority denied the request of these two brokerage houses to increase the time for making up the deficit in their CCA accounts.
The BSEC said in the order that the regulatory authority was imposing a previous directive on the brokerage houses issued on March 22, 2022.
According to the previous directive, there will be a suspension on the free limit facilities of the two brokerage houses.
Free limit means the amount of the aggregate (gross) trade exposure for each TREC holder on which no TREC holder’s margin will be applicable.
Dividend disbursement against ownership of the stock exchanges will be suspended.
Facilities of the initial public offering, repeat public offering and qualified investors’ offer will be suspended.
Licence renewing of the trading right entitlement certificate and depository participants will be on suspension.
Facility of opening new branches or digital booths will be suspended.
The stock exchange concerned will have to take the TREC holder company concerned under special supervision for one year after adjusting the money invested by clients and the shortage in securities. Also, it will examine the CCA and the securities in the depository participants.
The Dhaka Stock Exchange, Chittagong Stock Exchange and the CDBL will take necessary actions to implement the decisions of the BSEC, and submit a report to the commission, the directive said.
Messenger/Fameema
