Thailand is a promising wealth management market, the Swiss bank says.

Credit Suisse Securities Thailand, part of Credit Suisse, aims to continue focusing its business strategy towards wealth management to capture ample growth opportunities in the local market, which has a wealth valuation of 16.7 trillion baht ($5.12 billion), one of its senior figures says.

Thailand has a sizeable high net worth wealth pool that is comparable to other regional economies such as South Korea or Singapore, managing director Pornchai Prasertsintanah was quoted by the Bangkok Post as saying.

"Thai individuals and corporations are increasingly looking to diversify their investment overseas. This trend has played well to Credit Suisse's globally integrated platform that enables the company to diversify their investment overseas,” he said.

The country has been a rarity this year for delivering positive returns to equity investors, while most other emerging markets in Southeast Asia have suffered. Since the start of 2018, the MSCI Thailand Index has been positive, at 1.98 per cent as of 17 September (in dollars). The MSCI Emerging Market Index, excluding China, is down by 9.3 per cent. Better-than-expected earnings growth has boosted earnings. CB Asset Management Co, the nation’s biggest private money manager, joined Morgan Stanley in turning more bullish on the Thai market, according to Bloomberg on 29 August.

Credit Suisse was the first global bank to launch international wealth management services out of Bangkok in May 2016 under Credit Suisse Securities Thailand.

Credit Suisse is far from the only bank seeing Thailand as a wealth management opportunity. As reported in March this year, Swiss private banking group Julius Baer and Siam Commercial Bank, a Thailand-based group, signed an agreement to establish a joint venture focusing on offering wealth management services to Thai clients.

Thailand’s overall wealth market is estimated to be around $300 billion, with a rapidly growing population of high net worth individuals of approximately 30,000, according to the BCG Global Wealth Report 2017.

To give a specific example of Thai investment activity, last June UK-based Waverton Investment Management appointed Chaiyarit ‘Hoon’ Valyasevi as an analyst, based in the firm’s recently-opened Bangkok representative office.