The rise, reach and rallying power of the retail investor in Asia
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hi and welcome to JP Morgan's Making Sense. I'm Eloise Goulder and today I'm delighted to be sitting down with Claire Witts, Head of APAC Equity Market Structure, to discuss the rise of the Asia retail investor. Such a topical theme given the significance of this group today and given the strength we've seen in Asian markets this year, particularly those markets exposed to the AI trade from semis to memory. Claire, welcome. And to kick things off, just how big is retail participation across Asia today?
How big is retail participation across Asian markets today?
Thanks, Eloise. It's great to have you here in Hong Kong. The short answer is retail is very large, and in many Asian markets, it's dominant. So retail investors aren't just participating in the markets here, they're driving them. retail's always been big in this region in many markets there hasn't been a culture of funds or pension institutional investing so there's been a focus on single stock investing for wealth creation and if we look at the numbers in china retails about 50 to 55 percent of turnover that's roughly 200 billion us dollars a day in korea the percentage is even higher It's 55 up to 65% on some days. And currently that's about 40 to 45 billion US dollars a day of trading. Taiwan sits at about 48% and very significant retail volumes there as well in dollar value terms.
Then if we think about Japan, retail is now at around 28% of total turnover and India at about 34%, rising in both of those markets. But what's really important is that as Asian markets have rallied, the dollar value of retail money at work has just surged. As I mentioned, retail has always been a large part of Asia trading, but even if the percentage of the market is stable, how much money is going to work has expanded dramatically. And this is catalyzing liquidity and it's catalyzing growth. Both China and Korea are really good examples of that recently, where positive retail sentiment has actually been the trigger for a market turnaround. And that's in terms of volumes and also in terms of performance.
Well, those are incredible shares of volumes, especially when you compare them to the US, where we often discuss the rise in share of the US retail investor, but it's at a much lower level, at more like 20% to 25%. And of course, in Europe, that share is far, far lower. And it means that the retail investor here in Asia has both participated in but also driven such strong market performance this year. But Claire, while these whole index levels have moved significantly, under the surface, there's been real concentration in a few single names, hasn't there?
Yes, very much so. Asia is showing its own version of the Mag7 dynamic, but in some markets it's even more extreme. In Korea, around 65% of all the market turnover is in just two stocks. So a huge amount of that retail flow is going into a very small number of names. And I think what's changed is that these aren't just a local market story anymore. When these topics catch retail attention, it quickly becomes a global trend.
Why are Asian retail investors concentrating on a few single‑stock names?
For example, Asia's first single stock leveraged in ETFs on Korea stocks were actually launched in Hong Kong. They proved hugely popular with Hong Kong retail investors. And meanwhile, U.S. retail has been getting involved as well. We've seen plenty of memes on social media. I buy Korea right now. which came about because one of the large brokerage platforms enabled access to Korea for the first time recently. So at the center of all of this, we do have the AI theme and those fundamentals are real. But what we're seeing retail doing is accelerating and amplifying the trend. I think a great example of this was around the recent MSCI rebalance at the end of May. This was a record day for the Asian markets in terms of the institutional flow.
It was the biggest index rebalance ever. But in Korea, I was surprised to see that the next two days, the volumes were even bigger and they hit new record highs afterwards. But the trigger was completely different. Those two days of record highs were coming off a lot of retail excitement when Jensen Huang hosted a lot of career partner dinners with the large Korean companies.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:05–0:37
2
How big is retail participation across Asian markets today?
0:37–3:18
3
Why are Asian retail investors concentrating on a few single‑stock names?
3:18–6:17
4
How is the AI trade driving retail enthusiasm and market performance?
6:17–10:06
5
What structural drivers are shaping retail growth in Japan, Korea and China?
10:06–12:56
6
How does high retail participation change intraday market dynamics?
12:56–15:53
7
What are exchanges doing to attract and serve retail flow (T+1, longer hours, ETFs)?
15:53–16:15
Speakers
2 identifiedMore from Making Sense
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