TMBAM looks to be a trail-blazer
Former finance minister Thanong Bidaya, honorary chairman of TMB Asset Management (TMBAM), will push TMBAM to be a trail-blazer in leading all open-ended fixed-income funds in the industry to be assigned credit ratings.
TMBAM's Thanarat Fund, assigned AAA (tha)/V1+ (tha) by Fitch Ratings, was one of the few open-ended fixed-income funds to receive a ratings assignment. Founder of TMBAM when he was president of TMB Bank, Thanong was recently appointed as chairman of the Committee on Risk Management (CRM), a new unit of TMBAM. He said the committee had just agreed that Thanabodi, another TMBAM open-ended fixed-income fund, should be assigned a rating. "We'd like to be the pace-setter in the industry, pushing all open-ended fixed-income funds to be assigned ratings. This is for investors to consider how much risk and return they can handle," explained Thanong. "Some investors may not want to invest in AAA ratings funds, because they can handle the risk and want a higher return," he added. "These ratings are information to help investors decide. There are many open-ended fixed-income funds in the market. Most investors don't know what debt instruments the fund managers have invested in. At least the ratings can help." TMBAM's Thanarat is a fixed-income fund that invests in medium- to long-term bonds, while Thanabodi invests in short-term debt tools and is best known as a money-market fund. Money-market funds have grown increasingly over the past few years. They allow investors to buy or redeem the unit trust each day, and it takes one day to receive or send the money. This feature is similar to a bank's deposit product. However, money-market funds yield more than 4 per cent, compared with 0.75 per cent the bank gives to its savers. Besides TMBAM, Ayudhya Fund Management is another asset-management firm whose open-ended fixed-income fund is rated. Thanong said the Thai bond market needed an active secondary market to boost liquidity, in order to create a strong bond market. "It's a pity that bond trading in the market is not so active. Banks hold most of the bonds, the trading goes in one direction, so it's hard for the market to grow. To this end, Thanabodi's size has expanded faster than Thanarat's," said Thanong. Thanong said the purpose of establishing the CRM was to make sure that investors could rest assured when investing with TMBAM.
Piyarat Setthasiriphaiboon The Nation
|
