Thailand

Standard & Poor's has announced the launch of the S&P Asia Property 40 index, which will provide liquid exposure to leading publicly-listed companies in the Asian property and real estate markets

The S&P Asia Property 40 Index comprises 40 leading listed Asian property companies that meet size, liquidity and local listing requirements, with no single market having more than 15 stocks in the index or representing more than 40 per cent of the index. It is designed for use by banks and asset management companies to create retail investment products.

The index, which seeks to provide investors with diversified, investible exposure to the Asian property market, is a subset of the S&P/Citigroup Global Property Index. This presents an opportunity for the region's investors to diversify their own holdings beyond conventional stocks and bonds, and for foreign investors to gain exposure to the long-term growth of the Asian property markets.

Standard & Poor's has launched the S&P Asia Property 40 index because there is currently no tradable index that provides investors efficient access to this Asian asset class.'

The top 10 index components by market capitalisation are Mitsubishi Estate, Swire Pacific, Sun Hung Kai Properties, Mitsui Fudosan, Cheung Kong (Holdings), CapitaLand, Country Garden Holdings, Sumitomo Realty & Development, Guangzhou R&F Properties and Hang Lung Properties.