Investors are no longer mute spectators. To protect the value of their investments, this veritable brigade is now taking on corporate bigwigs and market operators. In Japan, for instance, two Sumitomo Bank investors have decided to sue the Board of Directors of the bank for allegedly bribing finance ministry officials with shareholders' money. The duo is also demanding that the money should be taken back. In anther instance, a group of angry share investors stormed the trading floor of the Dhaka Stock Exchange and ransacked the bourse to protest a prolonged fall in stock prices.Kazuyoshi Yuoka and Tadashi Matsumaru, members of the Shareholder Ombudsman group based in the western city of Osaka, have formally asked Sumitomo Bank's five auditors to sue the Board of Directors for Japanese shareholders' money. If the auditors fail to do so within 30 days, the two have said they will file a suit with the Osaka District Court, charging the entire management responsible for the bribery scandals.
Sumitomo Bankallegedly provided 1.91 million yen ($15,200) in benefits to the three finance ministry officials who have been arrested on suspicion of taking bribes in return for leaking regulatory information. ``I cannot forgive that the bank offered dirty money to public servants with shareholders knowing nothing,'' said Yuoka. Yuoka, a 55-year-old real estate company owner, and Matsumaru, a 50-year-old lawyer, have 1,000 shares each, the minimum lot available, in the giant bank.
Meanwhile, in Dhaka, investors damaged doors and windowpanes and burnt a carpet before police intervened to disperse them, bourse officials said. Police detained two protestors and were guarding the building in Moti Jheel commercial district.
The traders later demonstrated in front of the exchange and chanted slogans against brokers whom they blamed for price manipulations leading to a long bearish trend after unprecedented ups and downs in late 1996. Trading resumed at the exchange after a temporary suspension following the incident.
Themain index of the bourse, which fell 3.08 points or 0.5 per cent to 641.01 points on Sunday, a normal working day in predominantly Moslem Bangladesh, had risen to as high as 3,648 points in November 1996. The 1996-boom was traced to alleged manipulation by a section of brokers and leading business houses.
Hundreds of small traders, who invested in the bullish market cashing in their savings and selling properties, lost most of their investments when the boom went bust. The government hjas ordered a probe into the matter.
