SLT in acute share price gain in the wake of re-structuring announcement

By Hiran H.Senewiratne

SLT stocks showed an acute price gain at the CSE yesterday following President Ranil Wickremasinghe’s revelations in the course of delivering the 2023 budget speech that the ‘re-structuring of state owned entities, including SriLankan Airlines, Sri Lanka Telecom, Sri Lanka Insurance Corporation, the Colombo Hilton and Water’s Edge would be carried out through a state enterprise reform unit’.

The proceeds will be used to strengthen foreign reserves, the President said. The Colombo Hilton is owned by Hotel Developers, a former listed company.

Sri Lanka Telecom is already a listed company in which Malaysia’s UT Group already owns almost half of shares. SLT indicated a seven per cent or Rs 4.20 gain at the end of the day. Its share price started at Rs 59.70 at the end of the day it shot up to Rs 63.90.

Amid those developments both indices moved downwards. The All- Share Price Index went down by 55.8 points and S and P SL20 went down by 9.7 points. Turnover stood at Rs 941 million with two crossings. The crossings were reported in Sampath Bank, which crossed 1.2 million shares to the tune of Rs 40.5 million, its shares traded at Rs 32 and JKH 255,000 shares crossed to the tune of Rs 35.7 million, its shares traded at Rs 139.75.

In the retail market top seven companies that mainly contributed to the turnover were; Expolanka Holdings Rs 146 million (953,000 shares traded), Lanka IOC Rs 140 million (767,000 shares traded), SLT Rs 63.2 million (987,000 shares traded), Browns Investments Rs 46.2 million (eight million shares traded, Nestle Rs 40 million (43000 shares traded), JKH Rs 28.5 million (204,000 shares traded) and LOLC Finance Rs 26.1 million (3.6 million shares traded). During the day 43.8 million share volumes changed hands in 14000 share transactions.

Further, the government will appoint a presidential commission to review the public service and taxation, President Ranil Wickremesinghe said. The presidential commission will review the public service which was consuming most taxes, Wickremesinghe said. The presidential commission on taxation will also make recommendations on the establishment of a revenue authority, he said. The Board of Investment (BOI) and Export Development Board (EDB) will be merged.

Yesterday, the Central Bank -announced daily US dollar buying rate was Rs 360.96 and the selling rate Rs 371.75.