The nation's development of capital markets including stocks, equities and securitization issuances in the upcoming year will be very promising, financial experts said yesterday.
"2004 will be another good year for Taiwanese companies to raise [overseas] capital through the issuance of convertible bonds," Matthew Kirkby, managing director and head of equity capital markets, Asia Pacific, at ABN AMRO Rothschild, told a seminar yesterday that was organized by the China Credit Information Service Ltd (
Since Taiwan's high-tech sector dominated 90 percent of the non-Japan issue market last year in the Asia-Pacific region, Kirkby yesterday said that the technology sector will continue to dominate this year but other sectors such as telecommunications and finance are also becoming prominent.
Even traditional industries such as Taiwan Cement Corp (台泥) also joined the bond market, he added.
In his presentation, Kirbky noted that hedge funds -- "small but aggressive" -- have emerged to become major investors. He said that hedge funds took up between half and two-thirds of the issuance volume last year, creating an alternative investment boom with the world's over 8,000 funds managing in excess of US$750 billion.
ABN AMRO further estimates that the figure may increase to US$1.7 trillion by 2010, Kirbky said.
Kirbky, moreover, yesterday expressed a bullish view towards the nation's stock market, saying approximately US$10 billion to US$12 billion of funds are likely to flow into the country after the Morgan Stanley Capital International Inc and FTSE Group re-weight and upgrade Taiwan to a developed market.
The local benchmark is likely to climb to 7,010 points before the presidential election -- 1 percent from current levels, and continues to rise post the election, he said, adding that ABN AMBRO forecasts the nation's economic growth rate to hit 4.6 percent this year.
Meanwhile, Jerome Cheong (
He said that Asian countries have taken a great part in the securitization market in recent years. South Korea was the biggest player in the region, having launched over US$3 billion-worth securitization issuances in 2002, which were driven by consumer finance while Hong Kong was the second largest player with corporate lending over US$500 million in 1999, Cheong said.
Although it's still too early to tell the performance of Taiwan's upcoming securitization market, Cheong yesterday said that the nation's to-be-securitized issuances are expected to be diversified with credit-card debts, valued at NT$1 trillion in 2000, auto loans, valued at NT$80 billion and mortgage loans, valued at NT$2.5 trillion last year.
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