Thailand's business sentiment improved in February as rising tourist arrivals boosted confidence in the country's economic recovery, data showed on Wednesday.

The country's business sentiment index (BSI) climbed to 50.6 in February from January's reading of 49.8, rising above the 50-threshold for the first time in eight months, driven by stronger confidence in performance, total order books and employment, according to the Bank of Thailand (BOT), the central bank.

The improved sentiment came as increasing foreign tourist arrivals boosted confidence of respondents in almost all sectors of the non-manufacturing business, the BOT said in a statement.

The three-month expected BSI remained stable at 56.2, and the overall and most sub-sectors indices remained above the 50-threshold, reflecting improved confidence in most businesses going forward in the next three month, the written statement said.

The reading was based on a survey of 522 respondents from large and medium-sized firms, the central bank said.

Source : Xinhua

Electricity Generating Plc (Egco), the power generation arm of Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand, plans to spend 30 billion baht on growing its power business this year by increasing capacity by 1 gigawatt.

Additional capacity of 250 megawatts is projected from various new projects, including wind farms in Taiwan and the US, which would start commercial operations this year, said Thepparat Theppitak, president of Egco Group.

In Taiwan, 22 new wind turbines operated by Yunlin Holding GmbH are slated to generate 44MW of electricity. Egco is a major shareholder with a 25% stake in Yunlin Holding.

In the US, the company expects an additional 44MW from a new wind farm run by Apex Clean Energy. Egco holds a 17.4% stake in Apex Clean Energy.

Mr Thepparat said the investment in Apex Clean Energy promises good business prospects for Egco, which aims to focus more on renewable energy development.

The remaining 750MW would come from Egco's plan to acquire new power generation assets based on both fossil fuels and renewable energy.

“We are planning to conduct due diligence reviews for several projects in order to achieve the goal of 1GW added capacity in 2023." said Mr Thepparat.

Egco continues to seek new business opportunities in alternative energy development. Among them is a plan to conduct a feasibility study on a small modular nuclear power reactor to generate electricity.

It also wants to join hands with new business partners to use hydrogen as a new source for power generation to support its carbon dioxide reduction campaign.

The company aims to achieve a carbon neutrality goal by 2050.   

For the oil transport segment, Egco is preparing to transport oil from Saraburi to Khon Kaen through its partially owned Thai Pipeline Network (TPN) Co, a provider of oil pipeline transport services to northeastern Thailand and oil depot services.

The pipeline, with a carrying capacity of 5.4 billion litres, is scheduled to operate between April and May this year.

TPN was awarded a 20-year contract for oil transport, which can be extended by another two periods, each lasting 10 years.

Source : Bangkok Post

THAI conglomerate DTGO is weighing listing its UK hospitality assets via a real estate investment trust in Singapore as soon as next year, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

The Bangkok-based company is in talks with potential advisers on the initial public offering of the Reit, which could raise about £200 million (S$327.3 million), the people said. The UK hospitality assets involved could be worth about £500 million, said the people, who asked not to be identified as the process is private.

Deliberations are at an early stage and DTGO could still decide not to proceed with the Reit IPO, the people said. A representative for DTGO declined to comment.

The Reit IPO by DTGO, should it go ahead, would be the second such pound-denominated offering in Singapore, after Elite Commercial Reit raised about £135 million in 2020, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Any deal would be much-needed by the city-state where there has only been one IPO this year, raising just US$12.6 million.

Founded in 1993 by Thippaporn Ahriyavraromp with the concept of business-social integration, DTGO has grown into a conglomerate with interests in real estate, trading, technology, finance, entertainment and investment, according to its website. Thippaporn is the daughter of Dhanin Chearavanont, senior chairman at Charoen Pokphand Group, one of Thailand’s largest companies with interests in agriculture, food, retail and telecommunications.

DTGO bought a 17-hotel portfolio of IHG and Hilton franchised hotels in the UK from hedge fund Marathon Asset Management in 2019, confirming an earlier Bloomberg News report. BLOOMBERG

Source : THE BUSINESS TIME