Daejeon, South Korea

CAMBODIA’S stock exchange should open next year, Finance Minister Keat Chhon said this week, despite a previous goal of opening by the end of 2010.

The stock market “should be next year, but saying that we will discuss more with our partner”, Keat Chhon said Monday when asked whether the bourse would meet its planned 2010 launch date.

The minister’s comment at an International Monetary Fund conference in Daejeon, South Korea, marked the first time a government official had said publicly that the second launch date was in doubt, after an initial 2009 deadline was not met.

Previously, growing concern from the business community about whether the Cambodian Stock Exchange could open this year – the bourse building in Phnom Penh’s Camko City has yet to be constructed – had been met with assurances that the project was on-track.

Keat Chhon said that there were both internal and external factors affecting the exchange – such as the global impact of the sovereign debt crisis in Greece and the importance of preparing well domestically.

“We have to be careful for preparation to avoid problems,” he said, declining to comment further.

Some elements of the stock exchange still appear on track to be ready by December.

Inpyo Lee, project director of Korean Exchange, which holds a 45 percent stake in the CSX in a joint-venture with the government, said Monday that the administrative offices of the exchange would open in 2010.

He refused to be drawn on whether this would include the bourse itself.

Ming Bankosal, director general of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Cambodia, speaking in South Korea, said the results of a private-sector survey on the currency requirements for listings would be released in August.

ADDITIONAL REPORTING NGUON SOVAN