SET trading rose 43% in February, signals recovery

Trading value on the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET) in February rose 43% from the same period last year, with stocks in the food, banking and industrial sectors outperforming and providing a strong sign of a global economic recovery.

Soraphol Tulayasathien, the SET’s senior executive vice-president, said the global stock exchanges in February experienced volatility as bond yields spiked to 12-month high, inciting concerns over a rise in inflation that could cause major central banks to ease monetary policies sooner than expected.

The SET Index closed at 1,496.78 points at the end of February or up 2% from January, on the heels of the global economic rebound and optimism on the recovery in service and tourism sectors following the vaccine rollout.

The Market for Alternative Investment (MAI) Index recorded its highest month-end closing in two years at 379.07, or a 6.4% increase from January.

When considering the performance of each sector compared with the yearend report, agriculture and food, financial, industrial and service industries all outperformed the SET Index, which rose only 6.5%.

The SET’s average daily trading value and MAI soared 43.2% year-onyear to 94.32 billion baht or roughly US$3.08 billion.

The trading value of 126.92 billion baht on Feb 25, 2021 was the sixth highest since the SET was established.

Retail investors continued to dominate trading, accounting for 47.3% of total trading. They were net buyers for another month at 30.28 billion baht in February.

Brokers bought total 2.44 billion baht, while foreign investors were net sellers for the second consecutive month with a net sales of 18.61 billion baht. Local institutional investors sold a net 14.11 billion baht.

IPO activities in February continued with two new listings on the SET and one listing on the MAI.

According to the SET, Thailand’s IPO value in the first two months outpaced Asean peers, mainly from the listing of PTT Oil and Retail Business (OR).

Pakorn Peetathawatchai, the SET’s president, said the exchange recorded about 200,000 accounts of new investors in January, totalling 3,700,000 trading accounts, thanks to OR, which attracted many new-faced investors to the SET.

The figure is a huge improvement from 2020, which saw only 600,000 new accounts for the whole year.