3  Ibid. BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  As income increases and wealth accumulates, the demand for modern services is likely to grow faster, as they have higher income elasticities. Thus, we expect that demand for financial services in Asia – such as wealth management – will rise more than proportionately to the increase in household income. For instance, assets under management attributed to mass affluent and high net worth investors in Asia is expected to expand by 60% to reach USD 176 trillion by 2020. 4 7. These positive economic factors will continue to drive the growth of Asian financial institutions and Asian capital markets. Today, five of the top ten largest banks in the world by market capitalisation are Asian banks. 5 Primary market capital-raising in Asia via IPOs is the highest in the world. In the debt market, capital raised via Asian bond issuances have also doubled since 2009 after having achieved record sales in each of the past three years. II. Asia’s capital markets are ripe for closer integration  8. The strong growth of Asian economies and financial markets has created the conditions that are driving greater financial integration in the region. In China, home to the largest bank in the world by assets, banks and asset managers have acquired sufficient scale domestically to expand and look abroad to grow their businesses. Since 2012, the total amount of RQFII quota awarded by China has more than doubled for qualified foreign institutional investors to purchase mainland RMB-denominated securities.
It is steadily making progress in individual asset classes, among small groups of countries, sometimes bilaterally, where there is common interest and where markets and institutions are at similar stages of development. 12. We can see evidence of market integration among jurisdictions in several areas:  a. Banking. ASEAN is in discussions to complete a banking integration framework that will allow qualified ASEAN banks to progressively expand in each other’s’ jurisdictions. This initiative aims to create opportunities to strengthen regional banks in ASEAN and improve banking services offered to local markets. Even in other Asian countries where cross-border bank financing is restricted, we are seeing pockets opening up. For example, since China issued cross-border RMB rules for Suzhou Industrial Park (SIP) and Tianjin Eco City (TEC) in the middle of the year, about RMB 2 billion of loans have been approved from Singapore-based banks to companies in the two industrial parks. b. Equity Markets. In 2012, stock exchanges and regulators in Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore launched the ASEAN trading link to offer easy access to each other’s stock markets. Singapore and China have also established a Direct Listing Framework for Chinese companies last year. The framework will facilitate interested Chinese companies seeking direct listing opportunities in Singapore. c.  Debt Markets. ASEAN securities regulators have since April last year implemented common disclosure standards, which would allow issuers to issue debt securities across various ASEAN markets with a single prospectus.