SEC suspends 10% limit on share price movements

Sri Lanka’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) suspended a 10 per cent limit on share price movements with immediate effect, helping to boost the island nation’s bourse  to a two-month high.   The regulator imposed the 10 per cent daily limit in late 2010 to curb price manipulation in penny stocks and “pump-and-dump” schemes and to maintain market stability. The SEC has been imposing the limit on shares that moved in heavy trade and were volatile without a fundamental reason, to the anger of many brokers and high net worth investors who saw it as a way of controlling trading volume and limiting brokers’ commissions.