Cash squeeze looms for Malaysia’s frenzied amateur stock traders

Shares of glove makers have seen a meteoric rise in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

KUALA LUMPUR: Forced to stay home when Malaysia imposed the Covid-19 movement control order (MCO), Victor Yap sat in his living room, listening carefully to a March 27 speech by Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin.

As Muhyiddin presented the details of the government’s stimulus package, one thing in particular caught the eye of the 35-year-old property valuer from Kuala Lumpur: a six-month moratorium on loan repayments. Realising that the relief measure was set to leave him with spare cash given his two mortgages, Yap decided he would put the funds into shares.

“At first, I thought the extra cash would barely help me survive these tough times, but then I saw everyone jump into the stock market and make big money,” he said by phone. “I also jumped in and did well. It was better than just surviving.”

Now, with the moratorium set to lapse at the end of September, the father of two is one among hoards of individual investors looking to drop out of the market – a move that is threatening the benchmark equity index’s rebound from March lows and could further sap trading volumes, which surged to a record in August.

“The only way was all in, but now I have to go all out to return to normal life” and prepare to resume loan repayments, Yap said.

While stimulus measures and stay-at-home orders owing to the pandemic have seen amateur investors storm equity markets the world over, the retail frenzy has been particularly prominent in Malaysia. The boom in investing by newbies has also been a factor behind the meteoric rise in shares of glove makers and the recent surge in little-known Malaysian jewellers, with several of these stocks climbing more than 400% since the start of the year.

Yap said he used a part of his spare funds “to ride” the rally in glove makers. Some stocks in this space count among the world’s top performers this year, and their eye-popping gains have changed the contours of the broader Malaysian market.

The top three glove makers have added about RM100 billion in combined market value in 2020, with Top Glove Corp still the biggest gainer on the MSCI Asia Pacific Index. About US$1 of every US$10 invested in Malaysia’s stock market is a bet on gloves – a feat that makes the a play on global hygiene, much like South Korea and Taiwan are for semiconductors.

“Cash in hand will be reduced substantially the moment the moratorium is over and they have to start paying off their loans,” Tee Sze Chiah, head of retail research for Malaysia at Maybank Investment Bank Bhd, said referring to individual investors.

“I hope so, but I don’t think so,” he said, when asked if the rally in Malaysian stocks would sustain.

He expects trading volumes. which reached an all-time high of 27.8 billion shares on Aug 11, to drop in the months ahead.

Hold cash

In fact, volumes have already waned sharply in recent weeks, and price trends also suggest that the frenzy in Malaysian stocks is losing momentum. While the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI Index is still up nearly 25% from its March low, the gauge has fallen almost 6% since reaching its 2020-high on July 29.

Brokerages are turning cautious also because Malaysia’s stock exchange is preparing more measures to curb excessive speculation on share prices and ensure orderly trading following the surge in transactions.

Investors would be better placed if they hold a high portion of cash, as well as dividend stocks and those in the consumer staples sector, said Danny Wong, chief executive officer at Areca Capital Sdn. - FMT