FTSE Russell Postpones Indonesia Index Review
KONTAN.CO.ID - SINGAPORE. Index provider FTSE Russell has postponed a scheduled review for Indonesia, due to uncertainty about how freely stocks trade, in a fresh blow for markets in Southeast Asia's biggest economy which are facing criticism over trading and transparency.
About $120 billion has been wiped from the benchmark Jakarta Composite after larger rival MSCI warned last month the country risked a downgrade to frontier status.
Moody's cut its credit rating outlook last week.
FTSE Russell said in a February 9 statement that it will postpone a review planned for March following feedback from an advisory committee comprising of investment professionals and considering "adverse turnover and the uncertainty in determining the accurate free float percentages of Indonesian securities."
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With immediate effect, it said, newly listed Indonesian stocks will not be added to its products nor will they be updated to reflect other additions, deletions or changes in weighting that usually form part of regular index reviews.
MSCI had similarly frozen updates for Indonesian securities in its products.
MSCI and FTSE indexes are widely used as benchmarks for investors and are tracked by billions of dollars in passive funds, meaning their decisions can drive capital flows.