Equity, debt fundraising on SGX climbs 49% in January

TRADING activity in Singapore stocks held strong last month, despite it being a traditionally quiet period for Asia, the Singapore Exchange (SGX) said on Tuesday.

Although Chinese New Year festivities began in late January and several regional markets were closed, Singapore's total securities market turnover still rose 27 per cent to S$25.6 billion, compared to December.

The securities daily average value (SDAV) was also up, increasing 27 per cent month on month to S$1.2 billion.

Total equity and debt fundraising gained 49 per cent to S$50.4 billion from a month ago, supported by the year's first initial public offering by Resources Global Development on Catalist as well as the listing of debut international sovereign bonds by Laos.

Meanwhile, the market turnover value of exchange-traded funds on the Singapore bourse climbed 73 per cent month on month in January to S$263 million - its highest since August 2018.

As for structured warrants and daily leverage certificates (DLCs), their market turnover value soared 94 per cent to S$920 million from December. The most actively traded were structured warrants on the Hang Seng Index as well as DLCs on Tencent stock.

Following the US-China signing of the Phase One trade agreement, SGX's suite of equity derivatives grew in January due to institutional investor optimism on growth prospects for emerging Asia. This was despite worsening sentiment over the novel coronavirus situation towards the end of January.

Total traded volume in SGX equity index futures climbed 13 per cent on the month to 14.3 million contracts, the highest in five months. This was led by a 30 per cent jump for both the SGX FTSE China A50 Index Futures and the SGX Nifty 50 Index Futures.

Year on year, the SGX MSCI Singapore Index Futures and SGX Nikkei 225 Index Futures were the top performers, as their traded volumes rose to 33 per cent and 18 per cent respectively.

In commodity markets, prices of iron ore derivatives took a sharp turn, falling on news of the virus outbreak, SGX said. Total traded volume of iron ore derivatives in January dropped 8 per cent from December to 1.3 million contracts.

However, there were days of record open interest across SGX commodity derivatives last month - reflecting increased adoption of the bourse's products for risk management.