All Investors Given Equal Treatment: Set Chief

[george]

All investors given equal treatment, says SET chief

BANGKOK: -- The Stock Exchange of Thailand’s President Kittirat Na Ranong yesterday reiterated SET had given equal treatment for the examination of investors’ trading behavior no matter whether they are politicians, persons with close connection with politicians or common people.

In response to news reports that investment groups of politicians had been involved in the exploitation of the stock market, he said he wanted to give investors with similar surnames to politicians a fair treatment.

Currently, there are a few groups of politicians who invest in the stock market. They are considered general investors who could trade on the market normally.

Should the groups intend to exploit the market, he believed, they would do it by nominees.

The SET chief conceded it was very difficult to examine whether nominees are used to trade shares.

However, he reiterated, SET had the same standard on the examination of stock trading behavior of politicians, executives of listed companies, and general investors.

In particular, it would closely monitor if the trading involved investment groups of politicians who are in public attention.

He said SET already had efficient measures to examine stock trading behavior. Should any irregularities be found, they would be submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission for final examination.

Still, Mr. Kittirat said, SET had not yet found any irregularities of the stock trading as reported.

Even so, it had ordered a prohibition of net-settlement trading on some stocks as a warning to investors that there is high speculation on the stocks.

--TNA 2005-06-09