In March, the Yangon Stock Exchange opened to foreign traders and announced that it would add a sixth company to its bourse. Yet the subsequent COVID-19 pandemic has driven away new investors and sent stock prices into a nosedive. “After two trading days when we allowed foreigners to participate on the exchange, the outbreak began in Myanmar, so the majority of expatriates rushed home,” Thet Htun Oo, YSX executive senior manager told Bloomberg in an interview.
The Yangon Stock Exchange has struggled since its 2016 launch. Stock prices plunged over the following two years, and the exchange failed to expand. However, the YSX took a turn for the better in 2019, announcing its best month yet in August of that year. Riding this momentum, the YSX began allowing foreign traders to buy up to 35 percent shares in companies traded on the exchange, and it aimed to increase its bourse to a total of eight companies by the end of 2020.
Yet the pandemic has stopped this development in its tracks. There have been very few trades by foreigners, reported Bloomberg. Worse, the planned sixth listed company, logistics firm Ever Flow River Group Pcl, has delayed its YSX debut. Odds that the exchange could add an additional two companies to the bourse this year are slim.
