Managing director Boonchai Kiattanavith projected that the firm's money-market fund called T-Cash would be the leading fund to drive its total AUM.

The T-Cash fund jumped from Bt1.5 billion at the end of December to Bt4.1 billion at the end of last month in response to the fall in interest rates.

"While bank deposits offer a 0.75 interest rate, the T-Cash fund can generate more than 4 per cent of return. We have shortened the period of redemption for this fund from T+2 to T+1. We expect the fund to grow to more than Bt10 billion by the end of this year," he said.

The firm also expects 15 rollovers for three-, six- and 12-month funds to add another Bt10 billion to its AUM.

Boonchai targeted that the remainder would come from launches of the Foreign Investment Fund and two or three equities funds to be launched if market sentiment is back to normal.

"There has been a lot of bad news so far and we don't expect the market to respond well in the first half of this year. However, if all or some negative factors, including the political situation and unexpected Bank of Thailand measures, show some sign of positive improvement, the market could rally very well in the second half of the year," said chief investment officer Tragoolchitr Chittasaiyapan.

Despite the bad news, the declining interest-rate trend is the good news to raise market sentiment. Thanachart expects that the Monetary Policy Committee may cut its policy rate by another 50 to 75 basis points this year.

Piyarat Setthasiriphaiboon

The Nation