UPDATED
By Lee Wei LianKUALA LUMPUR, July 31 — Malaysians aged 18 and above will be able to subscribe to Permodalan Nasional Berhad's (PNB) Amanah Saham 1 Malaysia (AS1M) starting from Aug 5.
A minimum investment of 100 units at RM1 per unit has been set.
During the 30-day offer period, investors below the age of 55 will be limited to a maximum of 50,000 units while those above 55 will be able to buy up to 100,000 units.
Fifty per cent of units have been reserved for Bumiputeras during the offer period, while the quotas for Chinese, Indians and others have been fixed at 30, 15 and 5 respectively.
Units not taken up under the various quotas will be opened up to all after the offer period expires.
This early commitment that units unsubscribed under racial quotas will be released for general purchase reflects Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak's resolve to open up the economy and comes after a recent decision to lift ethnic quotas in the stock market.
The move is likely to be well received by the non-Malays who have responded overwhelmingly to recent PNB offerings and fully subscribed all units that were allocated to them in the Amanah Saham Malaysia fund in April and also rushed to buy unsubscribed Bumiputera allocations offered later in July.
The time-limited ethnic quotas will also help boost the credibility of Najib's 1 Malaysia campaign which stresses national unity and after which the fund was named.
"I believe this (limited quotas) is the fairest and most sincere way for PNB to get genuine investors while at the same time giving all Malaysians an equal opportunity to invest," Najib said at the launch of AS1M this morning.
The new fund is one of the "goodies" announced by Najib to mark his first 100 days in office.
Today, he added more "goodies" when he announced that some 50,000 incoming first-year undergraduates at public universities will receive 100 units of AS1M free, courtesy of PNB, Maybank, CIMB Bank, RHB Bank and Pos Malaysia.
According to PNB president and group chief executive officer Tan Sri Hamad Kamarul Piah Che Othman, AS1M will be benchmarked against the Malaysian Government Securities average 5-year yield which is currently between 3.7 and 4 per cent.
"Of course we target to do better," he told reporters this morning.
Hamad also revealed that PNB currently manages about RM120 billion worth of funds of which RM90 billion are funds sourced from the general public. Of the general public funds, some RM7 billion is sourced from the Bumiputera community.
At 10 billion units, AS1M is PNB's biggest fund to date.
Investors can buy it at ASNB, Pos Malaysia, Maybank, CIMB Bank and RHB Bank. No sales charges will be imposed during the offer period.
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Just beware of your money.