Stock market accounts experienced significant growth in 2023, driven by the Philippine Stock Exchange’s (PSE) collaboration with mobile wallet GCash, which has made opening stock market accounts more accessible to the public.
As of the end of 2023, the PSE reported a total of 1,906,019 stock market accounts, marking an 11.3% increase from the 1,712,734 accounts recorded in 2022. The PSE attributed this growth primarily to new accounts opened through the GStocks PH platform.
Launched in September 2022, GStocks is a joint initiative between the PSE, GCash, and stock brokerage firm AB Capital Securities. It enables GCash users to engage in stock trading via their mobile application.
This innovation is said to have significantly contributed to the rise of online accounts, which now represent 80% of total stock market accounts.
The PSE noted that online accounts reached 1,525,768 by the end of 2023, an increase of 21.2%. PSE president and CEO Ramon Monzon highlighted the importance of this development, stating,
“Giving e-wallet holders direct access to the stock market is instrumental in our drive to increase retail investor participation in the market.”
Retail investors dominate the stock market accounts, comprising 98.5% of the total, with institutional investors making up the remaining 1.5%.
Similarly, local investors account for 98.5% of total accounts, while foreign investors hold the remaining 1.5%. In the online segment, retail accounts represent 99.9% of the total, with local investors owning 98.8% and foreign investors 1.2%.
The average value per online trade increased by 1.8%, reaching P47,050.48 from the previous year’s average of P46,236.40. Additionally, the average value per trade across all market transactions rose by 9.6%, standing at P85,385.54 compared to P77,926.41 in 2022.
Featured image credit: Edited from Freepik
