It is my pleasure to welcome you to Malaysia for this 13th Annual Conference that is being organised by the Fixed Income, Money Market and Derivatives Association of India and the Primary Dealers Association of India. We are most pleased to host this conference here in Kuala Lumpur. The theme of this conference, “Asian Money, Bonds and Derivatives in the New Global Economy”, is a relevant topic to be discussed in this period of transition to an increasingly multipolar world, in which Asia together with other emerging regions will have an increasingly more important role. Asia’s potential and regional integration While this recent global financial crisis has provided us with challenges, it has also seen the resilience of Asia in weathering a number of major shocks in the international financial markets. Asian financial systems have demonstrated the capacity to continue to function and to meet the demands of its significant investment requirements. Moreover, the trend towards greater regional financial integration will provide for a more effective and efficient channeling of the sizeable surplus funds to such activities within the region. This increased intra-regional economic and financial activities is already taking place. The economic integration is supported by the strong demand from the growing middle class Asian population, which is projected to reach 3.3 billion by 2030. The intra-regional trade in Asia now represents more than 50 percent of total trade in the region, increasing from 32 percent in 1995. Intra-regional investment activities have also been on a rising trend.

We have the foundations to take our financial sector to a new level of development that will focus on new areas that will further strengthen the competitiveness and efficiency of the financial sector and its potential role in facilitating Malaysia’s ongoing economic transformation and in strengthening our linkages in the region. As Malaysia evolves and the new financial landscape emerges, one prominent area of focus is the development of deep, liquid and efficient financial markets in particular, the development of our domestic bond market. Malaysia’s bond market has already grown to MYR867 billion or 105 percent of GDP in 2011, and has become one of the largest debt securities market in South East Asia which has now been liberalized to allow issuance by foreign corporation and in multiple currency. Our Islamic capital markets have also thrived, with a growing presence of international issuers and investors operating in both the ringgit and foreign currency sukuk markets in Malaysia. We have seen new innovative structures for sukuk issuances including a world’s first issuance in Renminbi from Malaysia’s own sovereign wealth fund, Khazanah Holdings. The money and foreign exchange markets also continue to grow in depth and liquidity. The volumes transacted in the domestic money market and the foreign exchange market have now reached RM23.5 trillion and RM9.21 trillion trades respectively. Participation in these markets have also broadened significantly with the growing presence of new issuers, banks, institutions and investors in general, including a growing presence of regional players.