Greater regional financial integration While there has been a high level of economic integration, a more recent development has been the acceleration of regional financial integration. As high savings economies, this would facilitate a more efficient allocation of part of the surplus funds of the region into productive investments in the region. This would contribute towards lower financing costs in the region and reducing the risks while at the same time promoting the economic potential of the region. To facilitate financial integration, the liberalization of foreign exchange rules, the harmonization of standards and the removal of impediments to cross-border investment have been undertaken. The ASEAN Roadmap on Capital Market Development has been formulated to foster alliances and linkages in the equity and bond markets among ASEAN exchanges, including the harmonisation of regulations. In the equity markets, multiple listings are being promoted as regional bourses attract domestic companies in the region to list on their exchanges. The FTSE/ASEAN Index and the FTSE/ASEAN – 40 Index, launched in 2005, also serves to increase the integration of the regional bourses and to promote ASEAN as an asset class. In the bond markets, the Asian Bond Funds (ABF 1 and ABF 2) initiated by the central banks aim to broaden and deepen the regional bond markets. Meanwhile, the Asian Bond Markets Initiatives (ABMI) aims to enhance the infrastructure, which includes plans to develop a regional credit guarantee mechanism, a regional credit rating agency and a regional settlement link to facilitate cross-border transactions.
The Zambia Development Agency will incorporate the recommendations submitted from this exercise into its policy recommendations on how to improve the investment climate in the country. With these few remarks, I wish you good deliberations. I thank you…  2  BIS central bankers’ speeches