ASIAN stock markets could be a source of funds for the maritime industry in the future, according to Michael Smith, managing director of Turnbull Ltd, a Hong Kong-based shipping consultant.
Asia's booming economies have seen a doubling of intra-Asian trade from US$200 billion in 1988 to US$400 billion in 1992.
As a result of the growing intra-Asia trade, demands on Asian shipping fleets to service seaborne trade will increase substantially in the next few years, he said.
The same argument applies to the maritime support service industries - ports and container terminals, shipbuilding and ship-repair yards.
''All will have to be expanded to keep pace with the forecasts in growth.'' He said capital investment of tens of billions of dollars will be needed to finance port developments and shipyard facilities in Asia, with the fleet renewal programme alone for Asia put at over US$20 billion.
''Certainly there is no shortage of funds in Asia. It has one of the world's deepest pools of capital, reported to control 40 per cent of the world central bank reserves,'' Mr Smith said.
''Stock markets are a source of equity and in recent years a number of shipping companies, ports and ship-repair yards have successfully listed on the local stock exchanges.'' He said the maritime sector includes ship-owning, port operations, container terminal operations, shipbuilding, ship-repair and marine logistics - container depot operations, warehousing and engineering services - and more than 60 such companies are quoted on the regional exchanges, including India, Taiwan and South Korea, but excluding Japan.
