Later he headed equities sales and research at Securities One, the fast-growing Thai finance company that acquired First Asia. Today, five years after the baht’s collapse set off the Asian financial crisis , and nearly ruined Securities One , Kittiratt is back at the center of the market, but this time he’s trying to reform the bourse, as president of the Stock Exchange of Thailand.
Now 43 and “feeling old,” Kittiratt, who accepted his post last September, says his vision is more modest and practical than his predecessors,. When the SET index peaked in 1994, its market cap hit 3.5 trillion baht, worth $140 billion at the time, enough to make up 10 percent of the Morgan Stanley capital index for Asia ex-Japan. In those days SET leaders had grandiose plans to create a major regional exchange.
“I wouldn,t dare be that ambitious,” says Kittiratt, who, postcrash, ran his own investment bank specializing in distressed situations. His modest priorities for a market roughly one half its former size: to make the SET more transparent, to create a more attractive platform for issuers and to make brokers and investors “happy with us.” Finding ways to grow is the key objective. A new business development unit, launched last month, will work to attract listings and coax wary investors back into the market. A recent rally should help. Market cap could reach B3 trillion by year-end, says Kittiratt, betraying a bit of the SET’s old swagger. “If everything turns out right, we might even go higher.”
