KARACHI, Feb 2: A rigorous rating exercise is conducted by the Certified Financial Analysts Association of Pakistan (CFAAP) to declare the best equity analysts, a statement of the association states.

It said that each year, the CFAAP asks the CEOs of brokerage houses to nominate their best research analyst. The minimum criteria is at least one-year research experience and two detailed research reports written in the past 12 months (in this case July 2004 to June 2005).

The heads of research are automatically nominated by virtue of their positions. The association then sends a questionnaire to various fund managers seeking their opinion on how they rate their top five analysts in the market on criteria like accuracy of recommendation, writing ability, responsiveness to clients, etc. Based on the responses from these fund managers, the highest scoring analyst is selected as the best equity research analyst for the year.

The statement said that at the 3rd CFAAP excellence awards ceremony held recently, Murad Ansari of KASB Securities scored the highest overall points and was therefore declared the best equity research analyst for the year.

For the year 2004-05 the following analysts were nominated and were in the race (in alphabetical order): Abdullah Amin (AKD Securities), Ali Farid Khawaja (Alfalah Securities), Faisal Potrik (First Capital), Faisal Shaji (Capital One Equities), Humaira Zaheer (Capital One Equities), Imtiaz Gadar (KASB Securities), Khalid Iqbal Siddiqui (InvestCap), Muneeza Imtiaz (AKD Securities), Murad Ansari (KASB Securities), Salman Rasheed (Taurus Securities), Shahab Farooq (First Capital), Tanvir Abid (Live Securities), Tariq Hussain (Atlas Investment Bank) and Wajahat Ali (Elixir Securities).