Reshuffling at Karachi bourse on the cards

KARACHI: A large-scale reshuffling is anticipated at the higher offices of the Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) as with the change of guards, the team setup by Managing Director Adnan Afridi would be left leaderless, a KSE member said on Wednesday.

“I believe that the new chief executive would hardly continue with the lucratively paid team setup by the managing director, which also includes his relative,” the member said requesting anonymity.
The KSE managing director has finally decided to step down and tendered his resignation a few days before the expiry of his term as the continuation at the same office was not on the agenda.

Another member said that Afridi expressed his unavailability after he was not offered an extension by the board and the members. Sources said that the changes would be huge because with Afridi his team of marketing and its head is also likely to tender resignations. Head of the marketing team had already tendered his resignation, the sources said.
After Afridi completes his term, Haroon Askari would replace him as acting managing director until the board of directors appointed the new managing director for the bourse, the sources said.

Regarding the new managing director, name of Yaqub Memon has been circulating the arena, who has worked at the said position during the past. Market players, especially the top market participants are not happy the way Afridi was running the matters at the bourse.

They have also expressed concerns over massive spending by Afridi and his team. Two other top corporate-related seats to fall vacant by the end of the year included those of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan Chairman Salman Shaikh whose period of contract ends on November 1 and KSE Chairman Zubyr Soomro who would retire from the office on December 31.

It is still unclear if Shaikh and Soomro would retain their posts for another term. But both re-appointments would be unwelcome by the powerful broker fraternity, as their demand for a reversal to the pre-reforms practice of a broker chairman, in place of an SECP-nominated chairman, that has only recently subsided, could flare up, the sources added.