FEDERATION OF EURO-ASIAN STOCK EXCHANGES
ANNUAL REPORT APRIL 2011
FEDERATION OF EURO-ASIAN STOCK EXCHANGES
Huseyin Erkan
President of FEAS & Chairman and
CEO of the Istanbul Stock Exchange
The world economy expanded at a rate of
5% in 2010 and is forecasted to grow by
4,4% in 2011. Emerging economies have
contributed most (7,1%) to the economic
growth and are expected to keep on leading
the global recovery. While strong domestic
demand and capital inflows have been the
most influential factors fuelling growth in
emerging economies, inflation risks arising
in commodity and food prices have appeared
on the scene exerting pressure on policy
makers. Advanced economies have
experienced moderate levels of recovery
in 2010, with double dip recession fears
exacerbated in the mid year easing down.
In such an environment, the importance of
cooperation and coordination among stock
markets and regulatory authorities is once
more underlined. Euro-Asia Region uniting
frontier markets can be a leading model for
integrated markets creating a common shield
for economic turbulances while trading the
mutually beneficial products.
The regulatory authorities focus more on
managing risk and creating an integrated
margining system and encourage investors
to trade on organized exchanges. The
improvement of trading technologies also
facilitates the exchanges to act in coordination
and to initiate new common projects such as
common trading platforms. In this perspective,
I believe that standing together may give us
the chance to turn the global crisis into an
opportunity for our markets. Within this
context, the electronic connectivity and direct
market access alternative that may be created
among our member exchanges seems
rational. In this approach, each participating
exchange will keep its entity and stocks will be
traded in the home country stock exchange,
creating further liquidity in home markets.
In its sixteenth year of operation, FEAS
accomplished some noteworthy events such
as implementation of the Dow Jones FEAS
Indices . The FEAS Index is the first index to
measure the performance of companies
across the Euro-Asian region. It covers 95 %
of the free-float market capitalization of each
country in the respective index. Actually, three
indexes were launched in June 2009, one
composite, and two regional sub-indexes. The
Indeces are designed to underlie index-linked
investment products such as funds and
The future outlook for our markets seems to
depict that our member markets continue to
provide competitive and viable financing
options to both government and private
sectors.
structured products. The FEAS Composite
Index currently includes 375 stocks from 11
of the 34 member exchanges including Abu
Dhabi, Amman, Bahrain, Belgrade, Bulgaria,
Istanbul, Karachi, Macedonia, Muscat,
Sarajevo and Zagreb. Our aim is to launch
an investable blue chip index in the
forthcoming years.
During 2010, FEAS jointly hosted with its
members three meetings and conferences.
These were Environmental Social and
Corporate Governace (ESCG) meeting held
by the joint effort of FEAS, UNPRI and ISE
in February, the Executive Committee Meeting
and Working Committee Meeting held in
Amman, Jordan in May; the 16th FEAS
General Assembly Meeting and Executive
Committee Meeting held in Istanbul, Turkey,
celebrating the Federation’s 15th year, together
with the First FEAS Marketing Exhibition;
followed by ISE’s 25th year Anniversary
Meetings. Besides these meetings, the FEAS
Secretariat continues to pursue activities that
will promote the growth of member stock
exchanges operations such as bilateral visits,
workshops seminars held by the FEAS
Training Center, production of the FEAS movie
and the joint ISE/FEAS projects with
international associations and organizations
such as the UNPRI, World Federation of
Exchanges (WFE) and other International
Organizations.
The future outlook for our markets seems to
depict that our member markets continue to
provide competitive and viable financing
options to both government and private
sectors, while enhancing operations through
technology and expanding the services offered
to market participants. We surely continue to
focus on the areas of increased transparency
through investing in infrastructure and
developing regulations to promote stronger
environmental social governance. The efforts
of all our Task Force Members will surely play
a vital role in achieving our objectives through
their commitment and hard work and the
Secretariat for maintaining our cohesive
organization. As we close our 16th year, we
look to the future with a renewed sense of
purpose and a detailed strategy for achieving
our goals.
While celebrating the 15th year of FEAS, we
said good-by to the Secretary General Aril
Seren who has worked all through the
establishment and growth of the Federation.
I would like to extend my sincere thanks to him
for the great work he has done for FEAS. The
new Secretary General Mustafa Baltacı started
his position as of January 1, 2011. I wish him
all the best for his new position.
I also would like to take this opportunity
to extend my heartfelt thanks for their
contributions to Finans Asset Management,
Is Investment, Deutsche Boerse, Nasdaq
OMX, Tayburn Kurumsal, and Bloomberg for
making this publication possible. We hope that
you will take a moment to visit our contributor
section in FEAS website at www.feas.org and
read their articles in the following pages.
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