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Bolsa de Valores de Panamá Federico Boyd Ave & 49 Street Bolsa de Valores de Panamá Buiding Panamá City Panamá Republic

Main Indicators of the Bolsa de Valores de Panama

The BVP has operated to strengthen its operations within the framework of the law as an SRO and to develop the capital market in Panama. There are not other exchanges in Panamá or any formal over-the-counter market or any form of regulated market yet. The securities legislation that applies to the BVP will apply to any other market.

The following table details the main indicators for the BVP since the year 2000 up through June 2005. Although the number of issues has been reduced, the market capitalization of the securities traded through the BVP has grown dramatically since 2003. In part, this is due to the rebound from the economic slowdown that occurred in the years 2000-2002. The number of issuers listed dropped due to the implementation of the 1999 Securities Law which eliminated voluntary listings and thus culled the number marginal and “inactive“ issuers, leaving only those that traded and had a valid market reason for listing the securities with the BVP.

Main Indicators of the Bolsa de Valores de Panama, 2000 - June 2005

The following graph summarizes the level of all transactions of the BVP from 1995 through 2004. Relative to other stock exchanges, the BVP is small and limited in it´s offerings. There are a total of 83 issuers that trade either stocks or debt instruments at the BVP. There are 24 issuers that offer equity and 59 issuers that offer debt securities through the BVP. There are 10 closed- end investment funds that trade in the BVP.

During calendar year 2004 there were approximately 2,500 transactions that traded through the BVP. On a daily basis, the BVP registers has between ten (10) and fifteen (15) transactions. The high point of trading activity measured by the number of transactions was in 1998 when 5,760 trades were reported through the BVP. As is detailed below by other graphs, this is an evolving market that has been called by some experts a “frontier market”, given its volume and number of transactions.

The following graph indicates the number of public placements that were transacted through the BVP from 1995 up to and including 2004. The vast majority of these transactions were debt issues.

Traditionally, the sale of short term commercial paper has been an important transaction for the BVP due to the needs of Panamanian banks. Most of the transactions in short term papers were repos structured to offer banks liquidity for their treasury operations. However, in recent years the volume of these transactions has decreased dramatically. It is anticipated that the volume of these transactions will stabilize at the current level for the next few years.

Since 1999, the market for short and medium term government securities have grown in importance for the BVP. Whereas in 2000 the government issues accounted for only 15% of the income of the BVP, by 2004 the income attributable to these securities rose to 42%.

The following pie-chart contrasts the reduction in the repos traded through the BVP:

Regarding terminology in this section “Main Indicators” the term “Sec. Mkt” means “secondary market” and pertains to transactions among holder of securities other that the issuer and subsequent to the original issuance. “Primary Mkt”, or primary market issues also known as “primary issues” are first time sales of securities to the market by the issuers or underwriters. The term “turnover” refers to the volume of shares traded in a year as percentage of total volume listed. Average daily volume means the dollar amount of the securities traded in the year divided by the number of trading days.

It shall be clarified that in Panama does not operate other exchange and there is no other organized market beside the registered exchange yet. An organized OTC market has not been duly implemented in Panama.