One Asset Management Ltd and European index provider Stoxx Limited have created the Stoxx Asean Select Dividend 30 Index as a return benchmark for Asean investment.
The index will track high-dividend stocks with a maximum of seven companies per country and no minimum requirement but lower volatility, One Asset chief executive Win Udomrachtavanich said.
The top 30 companies ranked by 12-month historical dividend yields from Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Vietnam and Thailand will be components of the new index.
Stocks to be used in the index's calculation must have more than 80% in payout ratio and foreign investment capacity lower than 4%.
Real estate investment trusts will be excluded from the index.
Mr Win said the six countries last year had dividend yields in a range of 2.9% to 4.5%.
This compared with East Asia at 2.1%, the Global 1800 at 2.4%, North America 600 at 1.8% and the Europe 600 at 3.6%.
The Stoxx Asean Select Dividend 30 Index will cover 40% of Asean market capitalisation or US$134 billion, with Singapore weighting 24.7%, Malaysia 23%, Indonesia 22.6%, Thailand 15% and the Philippines 14.7%.
The top five companies in the new index are Keppel Land at 4.5%, United Tractors 4%, Universal Robina 3.9%, Indofood 3.7% and Jollibee Foods 3.6%.
The five Thai companies in the index are Bangchak Petroleum, Quality Houses, Delta Electronics, Samart Group and L.P.N. Development.
One Asset plans to launch the Asean Index Fund in May to track the Stoxx Asean Select Dividend 30 Index.
The fund awaits approval from the Securities and Exchange Commission.
One Asset will seek authorities' approval to apply the Asean Passport Fund to the Asean Index Fund so that it can be sold in Singapore and Malaysia without refiling initial public offering forms with securities and exchange officials in both countries.
Stoxx chief executive Hartmut Graf said a test run last month of the new index indicated a five-year annualised return of 13.4%, annualised volatility of 14.8% and gross dividend yields of 3.1%.