Trinity predicts bull market will send SET to 1,600 in two years
KRISSANA PARNSOONTHORN
The Thai stock market remains in an upturn cycle and will likely double in size to 1,600 points over the next one or two years, said Trinity Securities. Yesterday, the Stock Exchange of Thailand index rose 1.42% to close at 844.19 points, in heavy trade worth 40.02 billion baht.
Kampanart Lohacharoenvanich, the president of Trinity, said the Thai market, which had lagged its Asian counterparts in the last two years, had just begun its rally and the upturn cycle would continue.
The SET index is currently trading at levels not seen since early 1997 before the start of the Asian financial crisis.
''I'm confident that the index will likely reach 1,000 points by the end of this year and early next year. We will see the market touch 1,600 points, up 100% from current levels, over the next one or two years,'' he said yesterday.
The target is not unrealistic as other Asian bourses have grown on average by two or three fold from the crisis era and more than four fold for China.
However, Mr Kampanart said the local market would see a big consolidation in the near term before moving to the next stage.
The concerns about weak second-quarter earnings may pull back the market for a while.
Foreign fund flows will continue to be a key factor driving the market. The net buying position of foreign investors was about 200 billion baht during the past two years.
Both Thai and foreign investors are more confident in the Thai politics after political tensions have eased.
''The only factor pressuring the market is the baht appreciation and some investors are worried that the Bank of Thailand may impose a new measure to curb the strong baht,'' he said.
''Nobody knows what the new measure will be but they hope that the possible imposition will not adversely affect the market like the capital reserve rule imposed on Dec 18 last year.''
The SET suffered its worst one-day decline in history on Dec 19 last year with a 15% drop on investor panic over the central bank's capital controls.
Authorities later exempted foreign investments in the equity market from the 30% reserve rule.
At Trinity, the broker was also impacted by increased foreign investor participation during the past one or two years as its main customers are local retail investors.
The company yesterday opened its new web site Trinity Securities Group : กลุ่มบริษัทหลักทรัพย์ทรีนีตี้ as a new channel for online trading.
The channel is designed to facilitate both equity and futures trades as well as providing research analyses.
source: Bangkok Post 10.07.2007