PSE eyes more products to sustain stock market’s growth momentum

MANILA, Philippines - The operator of the country’s sole stock seeks to sustain the growth momentum in market activity through investor-friendly rules and products.

The newly-introduced Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) and the Singapore Exchange (SGX) index futures and soon-to-be-launched shariah list, as well as several new rules will stimulate investor appetite, its top official said.

“We need to do more work in terms of turning on more products,” said PSE president and CEO Hans B. Sicat.

He said the PSE is optimistic for 2014 given ample liquidity despite uncertainties in the first quarter.

“So far, we’re up 50 percent if you’re going to take a look at the daily average trading values,” Sicat said. The local stock market is enjoying local and foreign investor interest given the investment grade rating of the Philippines and robust economic and corporate growth.

“The market activity shows that there is also a higher level of confidence,” Sicat said.

Moving forward, the PSE is committed to introducing more products and rules.

The PSE and SGX recently launched the Philippines-linked derivatives products.

“We are very excited about this partnership with the SGX because we think this will allow foreign investors improved flexibility in trading our market,” Sicat said.

“While the intention is to ultimately have our own futures products traded at the PSE, this particular partnership provides us an opportunity to learn how to develop a futures market,” he added.

On Monday, First Metro Philippine Equity Exchange Traded Fund Inc. (FMETF) completed the first ETF listing in the PSE. ETFs are securities and investment instruments that monitor a commodity of assets like an index fund but trades like a normal stock in an exchange.

The PSE will soon release a list of shariah-compliant stocks that aims to attract Muslim investors.

For new rules, Sicat said the PSE is already finalizing the revised guidelines on backdoor listing and the listing of listing of all shares of a public company.

“There are number of things going on in terms of updated rules. A number of these have been forwarded to the Securities and Exchange Commission for finalization and approval,” Sicat said.

The general theme for the outstanding and issued shares is the new timetable while the new backdoor listing guidelines will facilitate inclusiveness, allowing existing shareholders to buy new stocks of a newly-listed entity, Sicat said.