NSB may not dispose stock investments: CB Governor

State-owned savings giant, the National Savings Bank (NSB) may have reversed its earlier decision to dispose the shares of 37 listed companies that are part of the bank’s equity portfolio, within a period of four months, according to the Central Bank Governor, Dr. Indrajit Coomaraswamy.

 
Responding to a media query over NSB’s recent calls for proposals from stockbrokers to dispose these shares, Dr. Coomaraswamy said: “I don’t know for 100 percent, but I think they are not going to dispose the shares of these companies.” 

The market analysts have partly blamed the dormant participation of State-owned institutional investors for the failing CSE indices. 

According to NSB’s 2017 annual report, the market value of its equity portfolio—which comprised of both trading and available for sale (AFS) portfolios—stood at Rs.6.8 billion.

The market value of the trading portfolio was Rs.2.35 billion, while the market value of the AFS portfolio stood at Rs.4.4 billion.

The book values of the trading and AFS portfolios were Rs.3.512 billion and Rs.3.1 billion respectively.