Asean bourses set road show to market regional blue chips

The Asean Exchanges is embarking on a regional road show early next year to promote blue-chip stocks as a “highly investable” basket of assets for retail investors.

Asean Exchanges groups seven bourses in seven countries of Southeast Asia, including the Philippine Stock Exchange.

Dubbed Invest Asean 2013, the tour will highlight the so-called Asean Stars, or the 180 “most exciting companies (of each of the six countries) as ranked by investability in terms of market capitalization and liquidity.”

That means 30 blue-chip stocks each as listed with the PSE, Bursa Malaysia, Singapore Exchange, Indonesia Stock Exchange as well as a total of 30 for both of Vietnam’s Hochiminh Stock Exchange and Hanoi Stock Exchange.

The road show will roll out first in Bangkok on Jan. 12, Singapore on Feb. 2 and Kuala Lumpur on March 2.

Interconnection of the region’s stock exchanges through the Asean Trading Link started last September with the linkup of the Singapore and Malaysia bourses. Thailand hooked up in mid-October. The four remaining member-exchanges—those from the Philippines, Indonesia and Vietnam—will connect at a later date that has yet to be announced.

Following the 17th Asean Exchanges CEOs meeting held in Malaysia last week, Bursa Malaysia chief executive Tajuddin Atan explained in a statement that the road show was meant to help increase the pool of Asean retail investors who are well-versed and familiar with trading Asean stocks other than those in their home market.

“Having recently launched the Asean Trading Link to facilitate cross-border trading, we are now determined to empower investors with keen knowledge and insights of the Asean capital market,” Tajuddin said.

“For a borderless Asean capital market to thrive, investors need to be able to make informed decisions about Asean markets and stocks,” he added.

Tajuddin said Invest Asean 2013 would also provide investors “exclusive access” to publicly listed companies of Asean Exchanges, market and sector outlook as well as a panel discussion among analysts on market outlook and stock picks.

Data from Asean Exchanges showed that its seven members have a combined market capitalization of more than $2 trillion covering more than 3,000 companies.