B Mirror Desk: S Alam Cold Rolled Steels, owned by the embattled S Alam Group, has seen its stock price surge dramatically on the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), despite its ongoing business challenges.

In just seven trading days, the steel-maker’s stock has jumped 72 per cent to Tk 16.90 on Sunday. This increase comes amid no clear catalyst for such a rise, raising concerns among market analysts.

Nowadays, the company has been grappling with frozen bank accounts, restricted access to let-ters of credit, and a lender’s move to auction its mortgaged assets amid recent political unrest.

Despite these setbacks, its stock continued its upward trajectory, gaining 9.74 per cent on Sunday to become the day’s top performer. The company was also the leading

gainer last week by posting a 57 per cent increase. Such an unusual price movement

prompted the prime bourse to serve a show-cause notice to the company authority, enquiring about the reasons behind that. However, the company returned a knee-jerk response on Sunday, saying there was no undisclosed price-sensitive information. Analysts said that speculative trading and the price manipulation was the major reason behind such an “abnormal” share price surge. “The stock price hike of the com-pany’s stock is unusual considering their current status,” said a leading stockbroker.