The government plans to transform Bangladesh’s capital market within a year, with greater reliance on market-based financing to cut borrowing costs and reduce dependence on bank loans and foreign development funds, Finance and Planning Minister Amir Khosru Mahmud Chowdhury said Sunday.
The government is also exploring ways to raise funds against public infrastructure assets and their future income, including the Padma and Jamuna bridges, he said.
“The face of Bangladesh’s capital market will change within the next year, if no accident occurs,” Khosru said while inaugurating World Investor Week 2026 in Dhaka.
He said the government was overhauling the country’s financial and public finance architecture to lower the cost of funds and make businesses more competitive.
“Capital market is the answer, bond market is the answer,” he said.
Khosru said businesses could not remain dependent on high-cost bank borrowing. A deeper capital and bond market was needed to provide alternative sources of long-term financing.
The government is therefore looking at securitising public assets and future revenue streams, he said, citing the Padma and Jamuna bridges as examples.
There were many such opportunities in both the public and private sectors, the minister said.
He also said Bangladesh could no longer depend on the World Bank, Asian Development Bank and International Monetary Fund to finance its development.
“We need to go to the market and get our money,” Khosru said, arguing that external development partners alone could not provide the financing needed to turn Bangladesh into a trillion-dollar economy by 2034.
He said Bangladesh needed around $50 billion a year for its development requirements, while development partners collectively could provide only a fraction of that amount.
The minister said both domestic and foreign investors were ready to invest in Bangladesh’s stock market. The government’s task was to build a market capable of attracting and retaining such investment, he said.
Khosru also urged financial-sector institutions to strengthen self-regulation rather than wait for directives from regulators.
“Every institution must learn to self-regulate. Do not wait for the regulator,” he said.
He said the credibility of the financial system depended heavily on the quality of corporate accounts and financial reporting.
Companies must therefore take greater responsibility for accurate reporting and internal compliance, he added.
Khosru cited the garment sector’s experience with self-regulation as an example.
During his tenure as commerce minister, responsibility for issuing utilisation declaration certificates for garment imports and exports was shifted from the Export Promotion Bureau to the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association following complaints of delays and irregularities.
The arrangement began working after the industry body developed the capacity to handle the process itself, he said.
Similar self-regulatory mechanisms in the financial sector would help implement reforms and improve the investment environment, Khosru said.
BSEC Chairman Masud Khan, Financial Institutions Division Secretary Nazma Mobarek and IDRA Chairman Mir Nadia Nivin, among others, attended the programme.