Foreign fund managers withdrew funds from the local equities and money markets in March 2024 amid the heightened global uncertainties and delayed interest rate adjustment by the US Federal Reserve.
Data from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas showed that foreign portfolio investments, or hot money, registered $236 million in net outflows in March, a reversal of the $689-million net inflows in February.
The BSP said transactions on foreign investments registered through authorized agent banks (AABs) showed gross outflows of $1.6 billion, exceeding the gross inflows of $1.4 billion in March.
Hot money refers to foreign funds temporarily parked in the equities and money market to take advantage of short-term interest.
The BSP said the $1.4-billion registered investments for the month were lower by 9.1 percent than $1.5 billion recorded in February.
It said 56.7 percent of registered investments were in Philippine Stock Exchange-listed securities amounting to $798 million, while the remaining 43.3 percent were in peso government securities worth $610 million.
The March investments mostly came from the United Kingdom, Singapore, United States (US), Switzerland and Luxembourg with combined share of 83.6 percent.
Meanwhile the $1.6-billion gross outflows in March increased 91.4 percent from the gross outflows recorded for February amounting to $859 million.
The US remained the top destination of outflows, receiving $887 million (or 53.9 percent) of total outward remittances.
The BSP said registered investments in March increased 12.1 percent from $1.3 billion recorded in the same month last year, while gross outflows went up by 24 percent from $1.3 billion.
The $236 million net outflows in March 2024 were larger compared to the net outflows amounting to $70 million a year earlier.
Data showed that in the first quarter, hot money resulted in net inflows of $377 million, a turnaround from the $328-million net outflows noted in the same period last year.
Registration of inward foreign investments delegated to authorized agent banks by the BSP is optional under the rules on foreign exchange (FX) transactions.