BENGALURU: Thai land’s benchmark jumped 4 percent on Monday after the prime minister’s party won a clear victory in a general election, fuelling hopes of greater political stability, while Indonesian equity markets climbed in afternoon trade.
Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul’s Bhumjaithai Party was far ahead of opposition parties, according to preliminary results released by the election commission, raising the prospect that a more stable coalition could help end a long period of instability.
Thailand’s SET Index rose as much as 4 percent to its strongest level in more than a year, while the baht appreciated 1.3 percent to 31.23 per US dollar, its highest level in more than a week.
The government will continue its economic policies and is preparing the second phase of a consumer subsidy programme, the country’s finance minister said.
Poon Panichpibool, a markets strategist at Krung Thai Bank, said the election result could boost confidence among international investors and lead to a potential continuation of pre-poll foreign inflows.
“I think in the next couple of months, we should see rising consumer confidence in Thailand based on expectations of incoming short-term stimulus from the newly elected government,” he said.
Elsewhere, Indonesia’s Jakarta Composite Index added 0.7 percent after losing nearly 12 percent over the last two weeks.
Investor confidence has been battered by MSCI’s warning of a potential downgrade to frontier-market status and Moody’s lowering the country’s credit rating outlook.
“Sentiments (in Indonesia) might be temporarily hampered by recent volatility in the capital markets, but are likely to stabilise on corrective measures,” Radhika Rao, senior economist with DBS Bank, wrote.
In the wake of the USD80 billion market rout, Indonesia had announced capital market governance reforms, including free float requirements.
Meanwhile, South Korea’s KOSPI index rose 4 percent on Monday, recovering from last week’s 2.6 percent drop and Taiwan’s benchmark index climbed 2 percent to its highest since late January.
Both of the tech-heavy indexes had come under pressure following a global tech selloff after artificial intelligence firm Anthropic unveiled a new legal tool for its Claude chatbot, raising worries over broader disruption to the information technology and software services sector.
Back in Southeast Asia, Singapore shares rose 0.4 percent, with gains limited by a 1 percent drop in shares of the country’s biggest bank, DBS Group. The bank said it expected to report a slightly lower net interest income in 2026 compared to last year.
The Singapore dollar inched higher on the day, while Taiwan’s dollar, the Malaysian ringgit and the Philippine peso were up around 0.4 percent each.
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