Net foreign portfolio investments rise to $321M in July, says Bangko Sentral

Foreign portfolio investments (FPIs) in the Philippines yielded a net inflow of $321 million July, mainly  because of the upbeat performance of the stock market, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas said Thursday.

 

The latest numbers were down 64 percent from $895 million in July 2013 , but up 630 percent from $44 million in June, central bank data showed.

 

The month-on-month improvement in portfolio investments was due to a strong stock market for the month, Bank of the Philippine Islands economist Nicholas Mapa said.

 

"Fund managers had no other place to go to since the euro zone growth is slowing down while there are problems in Argentina and Brazil," he said.

 

"There's this Russia-Ukraine tension as well, so funds were shifted to Asia for yields," he added.

 

Registered investments increased by 4.4 percent to $1.7 billion while outflows declined by 12.6 percent to $1.4 billion.

 

Net inflows of $137 million were recorded for PSE-listed securities and $213 million for peso government securities.

 

"About 69.7 percent of the investments were in PSE-listed securities (holding firms, property companies, banks, telecommunication firms, and food, beverage and tobacco firms), 30.2 percent in peso government securities," Bangko Sentral said.

 

The United States, United Kingdom, Singapore, Malaysia, and Germany were the top five sources of FPIs, with a combined share to total of 80.8 percent.

 

Also called “hot money,” FPIs are funds invested in stocks, government securities and money market. 

 

Hot money totaled $4.2 billion in net inflows last year, compared with a Bangko Sentral revised forecast of $3.2 billion. – VS, GMA News