The Czech Republic, Malaysia and Turkey have been promoted from the secondary emerging market category to the advanced emerging market one of the FTSE country classification.
Greece could be demoted from developed to advanced emerging and Taiwan is on the watch list to make the jump from advanced emerging to developed market.
The index provider just published the results of the FTSE Country Classification annual review. This is carried out every September and is the process by which global equity markets are classified as developed, advanced emerging, secondary emerging or frontier within the FTSE Global Equity Index Series.
In addition to approving changes that led to the Czech, the FTSE policy group issued its 2010 watchlist. This sees Ghana and Thailand joining the list for promotion to the frontier category and advanced emerging markets respectively. There is also the possibility for China “A” Share to be included as a secondary emerging market, Columbia to be moved from secondary emerging to frontier and Kazakhstan to be included as a frontier market. Kuwait could also be included in the classification under the secondary emerging tag.
Over the next year, FTSE will engage with market representatives of countries on the Watch List to discuss and review their progress against the assessment criteria, and continue to communicate their progress to the international investment community.
Mark Makepeace, chief executive of FTSE Group, said: “Global markets are constantly changing and more countries are opening their markets to international investment. Congratulations to the Czech Republic, Malaysia and Turkey on being promoted to advanced emerging market status, following significant changes to their regulations and investment procedures. Furthermore, Malaysia’s promotion to advanced emerging status and Thailand’s inclusion on the watch list highlights the encouraging progress taking place in the financial markets of the Asean [Association of Southeast Asian Nations] region.”
FTSE anticipates that from 2012 onwards, future country classification changes will be implemented at the same time as the relevant annual index reviews of each affected market.
©2010 funds europe
