Nepse limited to trade worth Rs 21.92m
KATHMANDU, MAY 17 -
Trading in Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) lasted for less than an hour on Wednesday, first due to Nepse software glitches and then a surge in index forcing the suspension of transactions for the day.
The software problem at 1pm halted transactions for an hour as Nepse used software placed at SinghDurbar as backup. When transactions started, the stock index rose by more than 5 percent forcing the stock market to implement circuit breaker. The Nepse suspends transactions for the day whenever index changes by more than 5 percent.
As a result, the market saw transaction worth only Rs 21.92 million, much less than the Nepse’s usual. Nepse General Manager Shanker Man Singh said that a back-up server based at Singha Durbar was used as the Nepse’s original server was under maintenance.
But stockbrokers said that the Nepse did not provide them with the changed internet protocol (IP) address and that they could not operate simultaneously. IP address is used to connect different computers within the network.
“By the time we contacted Nepse to obtain the IP address, it was already late and very little trading could take place,” said one stockbroker. Investors, encouraged by the political consensus, were eager to make investments in the capital market. However, the visit to the stockbroker’s office for the majority ended in disppointment as they were unable to trade stocks.
“We have faced similar problems, repeatedly in past too,” said Anjan Raj Poudyal, president of Stock Brokers’ Association of Nepal. “Unless all the brokers operate simultaneously, the market does not function efficiently as per the law of demand and supply. Investors suffered loss as they were unable to make investment before the share price went up,” he added.
The Nepse posted a notice on its website at noon, saying that transaction has been halted for half an hour for changing the server. When the transaction could not take place even at 12:30pm, the Nepse verbally notified stockbrokers that it would start at 1pm.
Apart from the problem in the server, the Nepse also had a problem on its website with no update on stocks.
During a brief trading on Wednesday, the market index registered a growth of 20.30 points to close at 412.19 points.
Source: The Kathmandu Post
