The masked Thai stocks' bear market. Individual retail investors fleeing.

In the long and recent past years, some 2/3 of total SET trading volume was generated by individual retail investors, this has dropped to barely 30% now for some time.  This reality represents a fleeing of the SET core retail investor base.  Why?  This is rarely acknowledged by the SET, the biz. press nor the brokers.  The ad hoc reasons given on why individual investors are abandoning direct SET investing are not at all convincing!  I for often stated reasons here suggest it has allot to do with Thai broker overall poor behavior along with the untold Thai stock bear market for some time:  since the present govt. in charge took over, substantial if not most individual Thai stocks, have dropped to half or more compared to their previous value.  

Is this not alarming?  Part has to do with the slowing Thai economy but in my view just as much has to do with Thai retail investors having lost confidence brokers will help them create new wealth.  If you look at secondary stock graphs like MAI or sSET or just plainly tabulate aggregate individual Thai stock returns since say 2015, you see a grave masked bear market here for some time, along with fleeing individual investors.

The below article from "Asia Times" depicts very well what has been transpiring here since the present govt. took over.  Sadly, it shows the slow, steady erosion Thailand's backbone core economy.  Where "the big 5" acclaimed winners take all -and near all of the rest has been left behind.  Its the reason true & sad story of the collapse of the smaller and mid cap sector on the SET & MAI, which nobody talks/writes about...including this reporter.   As this would affirm and show in numbers and graphs the silent near death of smaller and mid sized listed companies in Thailand, to the detriment of the Thai economy.   Some 2/3 of the Thai GDP is derived by smaller and mid sized companies, beyond the elitist top 5 -and most have dwindled into the doldrums stock price and otherwise. For the most their stock prices have collapsed and Thai Banks which wont' borrow them any money, as this article depicts. Sad.

https://www.asiatimes.com/2019/12/article/thailands-five-families-prop-and-imperil-prayut/