Investors overlook South-east Asia indices because they lack tech stocks

[SINGAPORE] As markets around the world piggyback on technology shares to ride a startling rebound from their pandemic lows, stock investors in South-east Asia are proving to be mere spectators.

Laden with so-called old-economy stocks such as those in the finance and real estate sectors, the MSCI Asean Index is down 19 per cent in 2020 even as similar gauges for the Asia-Pacific and world equities have wiped out their year-to-date losses. The poor show has also put Asean shares on course for their worst annual performance relative to global peers since 2013, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

"Asean is getting overlooked by some investors as it doesn't have any big tech names like the US and China," said Nirgunan Tiruchelvam, head of consumer equity research at Tellimer. "As long as tech rally lasts, South-east Asia will continue to underperform due to a lack of those companies."

Technology stocks have been at the forefront of the worldwide equity rally from March lows as the virus outbreak accelerated the global shift towards automation, and locked-down consumers fuelled demand for everything from video games to e-commerce. Asean is missing out as the tech and communication sector accounts for just about 11 per cent of the region's MSCI gauge. That's versus a weighting of more than a third in the S&P 500 Index and about a fourth in the MSCI Asia Pacific Index.

Further, excluding telecom firms leaves the technology space with just one company - Singapore's Venture Corp - with a less than 0.8 per cent weight in the South-east Asia measure. Financials and real estate make up about 42 per cent of the index.

"Given the high representation of cyclical stocks in the mix, short-term under-performance could sustain," said Pan Jingyi, a market strategist at IG Asia. Investors will "go about cautiously with these names amid the uncertainties", she said.

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THE OUTLIERS

That said, the stark underperformance of the broader Asean market belies the meteoric gains in some individual names that count among the world's hottest shares this year. Their weighting in the index, however, has been small.

These include Malaysia's Top Glove, which has jumped 377 per cent, PLDT, Philippines' largest telecom firm, which has risen 36 per cent. They carry a weighting of less than 2 per cent each in the MSCI Asean index. Further, Sea Ltd, a Singapore-based gaming, e-commerce and payments company, whose New York-listed shares have more than tripled in 2020, isn't a part of the gauge.

To be sure, the recent optimism around the development of a vaccine can provide some support to battered South-east Asian markets. The region's cyclical stocks can benefit from economic reopening and a potential rotation towards value style of investing.

"Once a viable vaccine is available for safe and mass global use, we believe that cyclical stocks will come back into focus," said Carmen Lee, head of investment research at OCBC. Asean's financial stocks will recover as and when the economies do, she said.

For now, the Philippines and Singapore are hurting the most, with benchmark gauges in the nations each down more than 20 per cent this year.

"The Philippines will remain a laggard" during the pandemic as the nation does not have significant technology and health-care stocks, said Rachelle Cruz, an analyst at AP Securities.

BLOOMBERG