Bursa sets sight on 20pc net increase

Bursa Malaysia Bhd aims to grow its net profit by at least 20 per cent per annum on average over the next three years.

In a statement today, Bursa Malaysia said its pre-tax profit for six months ended June 30, 2011 rose by 38 per cent to RM107.617 from RM78.15 million in the same period of 2010 due to the increase in stable revenue coming from among others, new listings.

Its revenue rose to RM217.16 million from RM172.375 million previously. For the second quarter ended June 30, 2011, its pre-tax profit increased to RM49.42 million from RM38.59 million in the same quarter of 2010. Its revenue jumped to RM101.05 million from RM84.266 million previously.

Bursa Malaysia said stable revenue, which was made up of listing fees, depository and broker services and information services among others, increased by eight per cent to RM56.6 million compared with the corresponding period last year.

"This was mainly attributed to higher information services revenue and higher listing fees and public issue fees due to the increase in initial public offerings (IPOs) and new structured warrants," it said.

There were 17 IPOs in the first half of this year compared with 12 in the corresponding period last year, it said. For structured warrants, Bursa Malaysia said, the number of listings in the first half of this year more than doubled to 201 compared with 86 in the same period last year.

Bursa Malaysia chief executive officer, Datuk Tajudin Attan, said the stronger securities markets performance was due to the ongoing catalytic activities of the Economic Transformation Programme that has spurred activities in select sectors such as finance and construction.

Tajudin said the bourse has seen an increase in average trading value by foreign investors by 37 per cent within the same period this year. He said efforts were being undertaken to promote the derivatives market to both the retail and institutional participants.

"The derivatives market has marked an impressive performance, recording an increase of 45 per cent to RM25.3 million in the first half of 2011, compared with RM17.5 million in the corresponding period last year," he said.

Tajudin said the migration to CME’s Globex® trading platform seemed to be bearing good results in trading volume, given the increased access and visibility.

"We saw an increase in participation of institutional traders to 42 per cent following the migration onto the CME Globex® trading platform in September 2010, compared to 38 per cent before the migration," he said.

He said in the immediate term, the bourse would look to increase the market participation base and some of the initiatives that had been put in place were the allowance for up to 100 proprietary day traders, of which there has been an increase from 36 to 55 currently.

Tajudin said Bursa Malaysia would also be engaging with both domestic and foreign institutional investors to relook this market given Malaysia’s revised positions in two major indices.

"With the dual licensing programme that allows securities dealer
representatives with adequate experience to fast-track into becoming futures broker representatives, we hope to see an increase in the scope of services and cross-selling by our intermediaries, thereby enlarging their client base," he
said.

He said liquidity remained a challenge but Bursa Malaysia was seeing changes in government-linked investment companies progressively releasing their holdings.

Bursa Malaysia hoped to ensure that the securities daily average trading value growth was at par with leading listed exchanges in the region; and achieve 50,000 contracts in the derivatives market by 2013, he said. -- Bernama