According to the statistics released today by the Monetary Authority of Macao, on 31 December 2019, investment of Macao residents (including individuals, the government and other legal entities but excluding Macao’s foreign exchange reserves) in securities issued by unrelated non-residents reached MOP921.8 billion at current market value, representing a rise of 14.0% from end-June 2019 or 36.2% from end-2018. Among the various instruments of portfolio investment, equity securities (including mutual funds and investment trust units), long-term debt securities and short-term debt securities were valued at MOP299.6 billion, MOP582.6 billion and MOP39.6 billion respectively. As compared with end-2018, equity securities, long-term debt securities and short-term debt securities increased by 30.8%, 36.0% and 106.8% respectively.

By geographical distribution, the Asian region continued to occupy the largest share of Macao residents’ external portfolio investment, at 58.5%. The rest was mainly placed in the North Atlantic and Caribbean (18.9%), Europe (10.6%), North America (9.5%) and Oceania (2.1%).

Investment in securities issued by Mainland Chinese entities, including those securities listed on non-Mainland exchanges, continued to assume the leading position, occupying 39.1% of local residents’ portfolio investment outside Macao. Its market value increased by 37.6% from end-2018 to MOP360.8 billion. The investment consisted of MOP113.0 billion in equity securities, MOP226.3 billion in long-term debt securities and MOP21.6 billion in short-term debt securities, taking up 37.7%, 38.8% and 54.5% of the respective total. Meanwhile, the share of investment in securities issued by Hong Kong SAR entities rose from 12.7% to 12.8%; the corresponding market value grew by 37.3% to MOP117.6 billion, of which equity securities and long-term debt securities amounted to MOP56.9 billion and MOP55.0 billion respectively.

Macao residents’ portfolio investment in the North Atlantic and Caribbean continued to increase. The market value of investment in this region rose by 21.0% from end-2018 to MOP174.2 billion, whereas its share in the total securities investment abroad decreased from 21.3% to 18.9%; the market value of portfolio investment in the British Virgin Islands grew by 15.2% to MOP85.5 billion.

Investment in European securities dropped by 0.3 percentage points to 10.6% in share but increased by 32.4% to MOP98.1 billion in market value from end-2018. Among the European countries, portfolio investment in the United Kingdom, Luxembourg and Ireland took up larger portions, valued at MOP27.6 billion, MOP17.9 billion and MOP14.7 billion respectively.

The bulk of investment in North America was placed in the United States. The market value of Macao residents’ investment in US securities rose by 47.0% from end-2018 to MOP81.6 billion while its share in the total portfolio investment abroad increased correspondingly from 8.2% to 8.9%.

The market value of Macao residents’ investment in countries along the “Belt and Road” excluding Mainland China rose by 83.1% from end-2018 to MOP70.3 billion, equivalent to 7.6% of the total portfolio investment abroad. Meanwhile, the market value of portfolio investment in Portuguese-speaking countries was MOP394.1 million, which was placed in securities issued by entities in Portugal and Brazil.

The compilation of Coordinated Portfolio Investment Survey (CPIS), jointly conducted by the Monetary Authority of Macao (AMCM) and the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC), follows the methodology advocated by the International Monetary Fund.