CSE unique as the only public gallery

The Colombo Stock Exchange (CSE) says it is the only stock exchange in the world to have a public gallery, which was closed this week due to a serious security threat owing to the fact that it was impossible to distinguish between genuine investors and others.

The public gallery was suspended on April 1, amidst some opposition from stock brokers who also had to leave the gallery. “The CSE is the only exchange in the world where both stockbrokers and investors have a common area,” Thushara Jayaratne, Manager Business Development at CSE. He added that the World Trade Centre (WTC) the present location of the CSE has its entire infrastructure and if something happens security-wise the CSE will come to a halt. “This is the only place where you can spend four to five hours without doing anything. We cannot distinguish between the genuine investors and those who idle. That is the reason the security threat cropped up. The geographical setting of the CSE poses security concerns,” he explained.
He noted that there are only nine brokers who had occupied the public gallery. “All these brokers have public galleries at their offices. This is just a trading floor and we felt it best to suspend the gallery due to imminent security threats,” he said.

He pointed out that this situation is completely different from any other company at WTC. “Other companies do not have 100 investors visiting them daily and spending four to five hours. Their customers will visit them and do their transactions and leave. The public gallery at CSE is not like that,” he explained. A stock market analyst said that CSE has been running this risk for the last seven years, since it started the public gallery. However he said a public gallery is not a necessity. "Some markets do not even have a trading floor. It is a responsibility of the brokering houses to provide their investors this