Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Foreign Investors doubt Najib policies?

May be the katak puru king Ibrahim Ali will come out with the statements saying that Foreign Investors are just like Chinese who never appreciate the government initiative. To be fair to all of us until today I only hear 1 Malaysia slogan without concrete actions.... 

April 27 (Bloomberg) -- Malaysia’s overseas equity investors were net sellers for a fourth month in March even as the government eased investment rules and announced more plans to open up the economy, CIMB Investment Bank Bhd. said.
    
 Foreign funds sold $64 million of Malaysian shares last month, adding to outflows of $180.5 million from December to February, CIMB analyst Terence Wong said, citing EPFR Global,
which collects data from more than 600 funds.
 
The withdrawal is “surprising as emerging Asia enjoyed a net inflow” of $2.5 billion in March, Wong said in a report today. “Other than Sri Lanka, Malaysia was the only country in
the region which saw an exit of funds in March.”

Overseas investors sold a net 8.57 billion ringgit ($2.6 billion) of Malaysian shares in 2009, down from about 38.6 billion ringgit in 2008, according to exchange data. In 2007, they bought a net 24.7 billion ringgit of Malaysian shares. The benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI Index rose 45 percent last year, lagging behind Southeast Asian rivals.

The gauge retreated 0.1 percent at 11:26 a.m. today, paring the year-to-date gain to 5.2 percent.

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said on March 30 the government will revise its affirmative action policies to target the nation’s poorest across all ethnic groups, moving away from 39-year-old race-based measures that the government now says may impede growth.

The government will also accelerate stake sales in government-linked companies to free up more shares for investors to trade. Najib, who became prime minister in April 2009, eased investment rules in June last year governing initial public offerings and takeovers to attract more overseas investors.

Foreign funds cut their holdings in palm oil producer IOI Corp. and Public Bank Bhd. in March, while boosting their holdings in Axiata Group Bhd., PLUS Expressways Bhd. and MISC Bhd., CIMB’s Wong said.

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