(CNN Philippines) — A net of $22 million worth of foreign portfolio investments left the Philippines last March, according to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP). This stands in stark contrast to the $1.2 billion net inflow registered in February.
The figure also ends a four-month streak of net inflows that began November last year. Nevertheless, March’s net outflows are still much lower than the net $93 million that left the country in the same period last year. October 2014 logged a much higher drop compared to March this year at $179.9 million.
The central bank points to March’s trend of profit taking in gross outflows as a cause of the decline.
Read: Foreign direct investments slump 71% in January
In a statement, the BSP said that the value of registered foreign portfolio investments stood at approximately $2.1 billion, representing an 18.3% month-on month decline and a 2.1% year-on-year decline. On the other hand, the bank registered $2.1 billion in total outflows, which are 54.7% higher than February’s figure ($1.4 billion), and slightly lower that of March last year ($2.2 billion).
A large majority of the registered investments — about 81.8% — came from securities listed in the Philippine Stock Exchange, with a value of $228 million. The central bank said that such securities mainly pertained to “holding firms; property companies; banks, food, beverage and tobacco companies; and telecommunications firms.”
The remaining lot came from peso-denominated government securities (17.7%) and unit investment trust funds (0.5%).
The bank said that the U.S., the U.K., Singapore, Luxembourg, and Hong Kong were the top five investor locales for March, with a combined share of 82.1%. The U.S. alone accounted for 78.5% of the total share.
