PH partners with Malaysia to create stronger bond markets

Philippine Dealing System Holdings Corp. (PDS Group) sealed a partnership with a Malaysian agency to efficiently deliver bond pricing and information services across the Philippines and Malaysia, a deal that should send positive signals to ASEAN region's overall bond market.

PDS is the holding firm for fixedincome trading platform Philippine Dealing and Exchange Corp. (PDEx)

A statement revealed on Monday that PDS Group and Bond Pricing Agency Malaysia (BPAM) entered into an agreement to make available their bond pricing and information services through a link to each other’s websites.

“This is the first collaboration between the Philippines and Malaysia to further promote and support the bond markets of the region,” the statement noted.

The exchange of website links is set to widen the reach of the clients of both BPAM and PDS Group to information across each other’s domestic bond markets.

This improved access to online market data and information would serve to heighten investors’ awareness of the Philippine and Malaysian bond markets, while cross-promoting bond markets between the two countries will contribute towards the growth of the intra-regional bond market.

“The exchange of links and the reciprocal dissemination of market information from established sources to each other’s stakeholders is one more step forward toward the development of a regional ASEAN+3 Bond Market,” PDS President and chief executive officer Cesar B. Crisol said.

ASEAN+3 is composed of the ten ASEAN member countries including the Philippines, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand and Viet Nam plus China, Japan and South Korea.

For his part, the BPAM CEO Meor Amri Meor Ayob said because of this deal, its agencies’ traders, issuers and investors will have the opportunity to venture into neighboring bond markets with more confidence and armed with readily available information.

“It is also important to bear in mind that, in order for Asia to firmly take its place in the global economy as the most dynamic region in the 21st century, creating and maintaining efficient and cooperative relations will be more important than ever,” the CEO said.

Based in Kuala Lumpur, BPAM is the first and only registered bond pricing agency accredited by the Securities Commission of Malaysia.

Over the last 10 years, BPAM has progressively developed its core business to become the principal source of valuation and reference data on the Malaysian sukuk and bond markets. BPAM’s services are delivered to both global and local institutions.

The PDS and BPAM website links were launched yesterday.