Chief Executive Officer's Message

6. Internationalising Our Market

Bringing new products and enhancements of existing products to the market and improving international participation are some of the key efforts that will help broaden our market's reach. Bursa Malaysia's initiatives include the following:

a. Multicurrency Securities Framework

Our efforts to develop a multicurrency infrastructure began in 2008. Comprising pre and post trade systems to support the listing, trading, clearing and settlement of multicurrency equities, the framework will cover fund flows and processes within the context of BNM's foreign exchange administration policy. With this initiative, we are more competitively positioned amongst regional markets to attract domestic and foreign issuers to list and cross list multicurrency securities. The availability of a multicurrency option also promotes the potential for regional linkages, which require settlement in a common currency. The launch of the first multi-currency product is expected to be within the first half of 2009.

b. FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI

As part of Bursa Malaysia's ongoing efforts to remain globally relevant and build a quality market, we are looking at adopting the FTSE global index methodology to our benchmark KLCI. The FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI will adopt FTSE's international index calculation methodology based on free float and liquidity.

In addition, we aim to work hand in hand with other regional exchanges to make the ASEAN Link a real possibility.

7. Our Regulatory Role

A well regulated market is crucial to fostering investor confidence. Regulation is an integral part of Bursa Malaysia and we place significant emphasis on market regulation. The regulatory function is structured to be independent of the business units in order to manage both perceived and real conflicts of interest (COI).

Maintaining a fair and orderly market and providing investor confidence is at the core of what we do. We focused on several key themes during the year to ensure high levels of market transparency, orderly trading and investor protection. These revolved around enhancing CG practices, improving standards of disclosure, promoting high standards of business conduct amongst participants, increasing the effectiveness of enforcement and elevating the level of education and awareness in the industry.

We are committed to maintaining high standards of CG. Amongst the initiatives under progress are developing a CG practical guide for directors, collaborating with institutional investors to create awareness on how shareholders rights can influence company behaviour and, working with industry organizations and professionals bodies to strengthen the CG landscape.

We have vigilantly tracked the effects of global downturn and proactively monitored and managed the implications to our Participants and listed issuers by heightening supervision, monitoring and engagement, to ensure investor protection.