Bogota 2013 Blog: Colombian Market Seeks to Draw Global Crowd
In a country that has already combined its stock exchange with Chile and Peru, Colombia seeks to expand its stock market’s global focus.
Colombia hopes to expand the international involvement in its stock market by adding at least two more overseas companies to trade in its bourse said Juan Pablo Cordoba at the Reuters Latin America Investment Summit on May 20. The head of Colombia’s stock exchange announced Colombia’s intentions to “internationalize” its stock market by attracting foreign investors who want to increase their presence in emerging and corporate bond markets, saying:
The Colombian market will benefit from having more players…To achieve that there are two paths—one is to wait for them to come and other is to make it happen and seek greater internationalization of Colombia's capital markets.
Foreign participation in Colombia’s bourse has increased 11 percent in the past 5 years, rising from 3 percent in 2008 to 14 percent in 2012, and counts five international companies as listed on its stock exchange. The country achieved a record $16.7 billion in foreign direct investment to Colombian stock and bond markets in 2012.
While the past decade has seen growing international interest in the Andean country’s bourse, Colombia took a globally focused step in 2011, when it joined with Chile and Peru’s bourses to create the Latin American Integrated Market (known as MILA for its Spanish acronym). MILA began conducting cross-border trading in May 2011 and was valued at a combined market capitalization of $727 billion in April 2013.