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36 Annual Report 2012
• Futures market
TFEX grew and prospered in various fields in 2012, with total trade volume increasing to 10,457,928 contracts, or 43,823
contracts per day on average, an increase of 6.5 percent from last year, and with 238,981 outstanding contracts, up 323 percent
from end-2011. At the end of 2012, there were 80,893 accounts traded, a rise by 28.6 percent from 2011.
In 2012, TFEX increased the variety of products to make them more effective tools to manage risk and create return for
operators and investors. The new products are as follows:
1) USD Futures, futures contracts based on U.S. dollars,
debuted on June 5 to an overwhelming and unexpected response,
with a volume of higher than 3,429 contracts. Trading USD
Futures was Thailand’s first time that the authorities allowed
currency exchange trading without an underlying transaction. The
Finance Ministry, Bank of Thailand and Securities and Exchange
Commission saw the necessity to provide additional currency
exchange management tools which would benefit Thailand in the
long term to cope with industrial and financial liberalization.
2) Sector Index Futures, based on SET industry sector
indices, commenced trading on October 29 with contracts linked
to five business sectors, namely Banking, Commerce, Energy and
Utilities, Food and Beverage, and Information and Communication Technology, which are the leading sectors receiving continuous
attention from investors. The movement of the index in each sector is in line with the stocks in that sector.
Moreover, SET has improved its current futures products to boost liquidity, which are SET 50 Index Futures, by adding the
two nearest monthly contracts on top of existing four quarterly contracts, resulting in six contract months in total -- one-month
contract, two-month contract, three-month contract and three quarter contracts. The new SET50 Futures series will enable investors
to more efficiently manage short-term volatility of the SET index. SET also expanded the scope of Single Stock Futures (SSF) to
cover stocks in the set 100 Index and adjusted the SSF position limit from a single level of 20,000 contracts for all stock futures
to a proportion of the listed shares of the underlying stocks in between 20,000-435,000 contracts, enabling investors to manage
their portfolios more effectively.
In 2012, TFEX accepted new full license members to reach a total of 40, including five gold brokers who upgraded their
membership status of precious metal-related members to become full license members .
Broadening foreign institutional investors base: Increasing liquidity for the Thai bourse
SET has a key mission to support listed companies by providing information channels to reflect the value of the firms and the
overall economy of the country. This is another strategy to respond to the demands of international investors who wish to trade in
the Thai bourse.