Economic

The Colombo Bourse sustained its upward momentum for the fifth consecutive market day yesterday thanks to continued buying on improved investor sentiments. The ASPI increased by 2.04% or 94.18 points to close at 4,701.03 points, while the S&P SL20 Index also increased by 2.11% or 38.94 points to close at 1,886.65.

The global economy could suffer between $5.8 trillion and $8.8 trillion in losses — equivalent to 6.4% to 9.7% of global gross domestic product (GDP) — as a result of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, says a new report released by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) last week.

Sri Lanka Tourism is seeing a silver lining as European and high-end Indian travellers have begun to inquire on forward bookings, while the Government is sorting out the COVID-19 protocol to welcome guests from July onwards.

But Financial, Health and Professional Services, Wholesale and Retail Trade, and Transportation sub-sectors hopeful of recovery after virus mitigation measures ease

Business leader Dhammika Perera’s prediction on the number of global COVID-19 last week during the Daily FT-SC Securities webinar has come true.

The Vehicle Importers Association of Sri Lanka (VIASL) wants the blanket ban to be lifted and for the Government to consider introducing other restrictions including higher margin on LCs.

කොරෝනා වෛරසය නිසා අඩපණ වූ දේශීය ක්‍රියාකාරකම් මෙම වසරේ සිව්වැනි කාර්තුවේදී සාමාන්‍ය තත්ත්වයට පත්වනු ඇතැයි ශ්‍රී ලංකා මහ බැංකුව අපේක්ෂා කරයි.

A net outflow of the foreign investment amounting to $ 118 million was recorded from the rupee denominated Government securities market in February, resulting in a cumulative net outflow of $ 99 million during the first two months of 2020.

සෞඛ්‍ය නිර්දේශ හා ජාත්‍යන්තර ගුවන්සේවා බලධාරීන්ගේ මාර්ගෝපදේශයන්ට අනුව කටුනායක ජාත්‍යන්තර ගුවන් තොටුපල සියළු මෙහෙයුම් කඩිනමින් ආරම්භ කිරීමට අපේක්ෂා කරන බව කාර්මික අපනයන, ආයෝජන ප්‍රවර්ධන, සංචාරක හා ගුවන්සේවා අමාත්‍ය ප්‍රසන්න රණතුංග මහතා සදහන් කරයි.

The Colombo stock market showed its resilience within a week of early battering recouping lost ground and emerging stronger thanks to positive investor sentiments brokers and analysts said yesterday.

Sri Lanka Telecom PLC Group yesterday released its financial results for the three months ending on 31 March 2020 with total revenue for the quarter recorded at Rs. 22.1 billion, which is a 3.8% growth compared to the Rs. 21.3 billion during the same period in 2019.

The apparel industry received a big boost from the US - an order of 200 million face masks with Brandix exporting the first consignment. Special Representative of the President and Head of the Presidential Task Force on Economic Revival and Poverty Eradication Basil Rajapaksa symbolically handed over the first batch of face masks from a production of 200 million face masks for export by Brandix, to US Ambassador to Sri Lanka and Maldives Alaina B. Teplitz.

Bloomberg: Sri Lanka’s dollar bonds have been the worst-performing sovereign notes in Asia this year. But BNP Paribas Asset Management and Union Investment Privatfonds GmbH say it might now be time to buy.

Reuters: Stocks rose for the third straight session on Friday, boosted by gains in consumer staples and financial stocks.

Healthy growth in business volumes and an extraordinary contribution from other income, before the slowdown attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic, have enabled the Commercial Bank of Ceylon PLC to make a steady start to 2020, despite the continuing increase in impairment charges quarter-on-quarter.

The Government has decided to waive off three months of rent of all duty free shops and service providers at Bandaranaike International Airport due to closure on account of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Reuters: Stocks rose for the third straight session on Friday, boosted by gains in consumer staples and financial stocks.

The Central Bank yesterday announced further extraordinary measures to boost new funding and liquidity to support the private sector and spur demand in the economy impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.