In what could be a sign of healthy virtual stock trade, the average value per online transaction rose 33.2 percent in 2022 to P46,236.40 from P34,701.80 in 2021, the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) said.
The PSE said online stockbroker accounts reached 1.26 million last year, an 8.6 percent increase from the prior year.
On Monday, the bellwether index closed up 9.63 points, a 0.15 percent hike to 6,521.64. The peso closed at 56.24 to the dollar, down from 55.89 on Friday.
The PSE noted close to 100,000 new online accounts were opened last year.
Traditional stockbrokerage accounts, however, were reduced by 7,156 to 453,827.
“Given this, the total stock market accounts registered in 2022 was at 1.7 million, up by 5.7 percent from 2021’s 1.62 million accounts,” it said.
Ramon Monzon, PSE president, said the decline in accounts was affected by the clean-up of dormant accounts done in compliance with the Anti-Money Laundering Act.
“The accounts were mostly owned by local retail investors as they held a little over 98 percent of the total stock market accounts. Institutional investors and foreign investors owned 1.9 percent and 1.7 percent of the total stock market accounts, respectively,” Monzon said.
Monzon expressed confidence accounts will still grow in the years to come as online trading has become the norm and more stock investing features are rolled out in finance apps.
“For online accounts, 51 percent were held by female investors while the rest are owned by their male counterparts,” the PSE said.
About half of the retail accounts were held by investors aged 30 to 44 age, up from 33.9 percent in 2021. The 45 to 59 year old investors comprised 20.7 percent of accounts, followed by the 18 to 29 year olds at 18.7 percent and investors aged 60 and above at 10.8 percent.
“The ownership by age of online accounts mirrored that of total retail accounts with the 30 to 44 age group taking up the largest share at 55.7 percent of online accounts. The 18 to 29 year old investors followed registering a 20.8 percent share,” the PSE said.
The 45 to 59 age bracket held 18.4 percent of the online accounts and the 60 and above age group owned 5.0 of online accounts,” it added.
The PSE said investors earning P500,000 annually made up 53.5 percent of retail accounts and 72.9 percent of online retail accounts.
Metro Manila continued to have the biggest number of retail investors at 81.5 percent, trailed by Luzon 10.7 percent, Visayas at 3.7 percent and Mindanao at 2.5 percent.
Investors based overseas accounted for 1.7 percent of retail investors. Foreign nationals with investments in the local market were mostly Chinese, American, Japanese, Korean and Taiwanese.
As of the closing bell, the PSE’s broader All Shares index was up 11.46 points or 0.33 percent to 3,486.33.
Gainers edged losers 114 to 64 with 37 stocks unchanged. Trading turnover reached P3.38 billion.
The currency opened at 56.01 and hit a high of 56 and a low of 56.23. Trading turnover reached $1.08 billion.
Tracking the strength in US dollar, most Asian currencies in the region were largely weak.
Clair Alviar, analyst at Philstocks Financial Inc. said investors cheered the resolution of the US debt ceiling issue.
Juan Paolo Colet, managing director at China Bank Capital Corp., said investors remained cautious ahead of Tuesday’s release of inflation figures for May.
Most actively traded SM Prime Holdings Inc. was up P0.05 to P32.90. Bank of the Philippine Islands was up P0.70 to P100.70. BDO Unibank Inc. was down P1.30 to P138.10. Ayala Corp. was up P12 to P670. Ayala Land Inc. was down P0.05 to P25.90. International Container Terminal Services Inc. was down P3.80 to P199. Robinsons Land Corp. was up P0.40 to P14.42. Monde Nissin Corp. was up P0.35 to P8.20. Agrinurture Inc. was down P0.02 to P7.35. SM Investments Corp. was up P8 to P928.
