Economy and commerce

Cambodia’s Internet penetration more than doubled to 3.1 per cent of the population in 2011, up from 1.3 per cent a year earlier, according to the Internet World Stats website. The country had 449,160 Internet users at the end of last year and 491,480 Facebook users ...

The expansion of Cambodia’s information and communications technology sector was highlighted at the ICT Expo on Diamond Island yesterday, as the sector’s bellwether companies continue to eye the Kingdom. Sony Corp, which took part in the eighth annual expo for the first time this year, set ...

Sellers have dominated the Cambodia Securities Exchange for the last seven days of trading, and the downward trend for the single stock, Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority, was expected to continue into next week, experts said. PPWSA closed down 4.6 per cent yesterday at 7,250 riel ...

Kampot officials are looking to the Bokor Mountain Resort, a US$1 billion project that opens today, to drive tourism growth in the burgeoning seaside destination. The provincial Tourism Department said the number of domestic visitors to Kampot had risen 120 per cent to 338,000 in the ...

Mobile payment company Wing was in talks on partnering with a US technology firm that plans to assemble Android tablets in Cambodia, in what could be another step away from the country’s staple manufactured good – garments. Although a final partnership agreement had yet to made ...

Export to Vietnam climbed more than 57 per cent year on year in the first quarter of 2012 as farmers looked for alternative destinations for products that went to Thailand last year. The primarily agricultural exports to Cambodia’s eastern neighbour were worth US$201.5 million, up from ...

The government will spend a total of $85 million, funded by a Japanese government loan, for the third and final phase of the expansion of Sihanoukville Autonomous Port, which will more than double the port’s import-export capacity by 2012, Prime Minister Hun Sen said yesterday. “It ...

Kampot Port Co will break ground on a Kampot port in September, company officials said yesterday. The port will be an important part of a long-delayed Kampot Special Economic Zone (KSEZ), which is hoped to revitalise trade and commerce in the province. Vinh Huor, president of the ...

Japan, the most experienced country in the industrial sector, has cooperated with Cambodia, aiming at enhancing Cambodia’s industrial policy better to attract more investments, especially the Japanese investors who have kept an eye out on Cambodia over the last several years. The workshop under the theme: Towards the Cambodia’s Industrial Policy, was conducted On April ...

Investors in Cambodia’s northeast on Monday announced an investment in a cassava-processing plant in Battambang province. Prak Phoung Kesoa, assistant CEO at Battambang Agro-Industry, said yesterday that the plant would be 100 per cent Cambodian owned ...

Industries such as tourism and garment production are booming. Mining is taking off and the Cambodian Stock Exchange (CSX) is finally up and running after a 10-month delay with Phnom Penh Water Supply (PPWS) its first listing. “PPWS is considered one of the best managed state ...

The chevron oil company announced it is not ready to pump offshore oil in Block A in Cambodia. Mr. Steve Glick, Chevron President said: “the company is not ready to pump oil in Block A offshore Cambodia on the set-date of December 2012, complaining that more tasks need to be completed, but expressed ...

The value-added textile sector, as the garment sector is called in Pakistan, has chosen Cambodia as an alternative destination for relocating their manufacturing units, owing to continued electricity and gas supply problems in the country. The power and gas shortage is affecting productivity in Pakistan’s apparel sector, which in turn, is affecting the sector’s exports. ...

Government officials have joined forces with Japanese experts to formulate a new plan for economic diversity in Cambodia. Foreign direct investment in Cambodian industry has largely gone to garment manufacturing during the past 10 years, putting the country at risk of economic shock in the event ...

The Cambodia Securities Exchange has seen a sharp decrease in action this week, with trading volume yesterday falling to 3,453 shares, down nearly 100 per cent from Monday. Despite the drop, which was accompanied by a strong shift from institutional to retail investors, experts have stressed the time ...

While the Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority’s (PPWSA) share price continued to fall yesterday, a second state firm came a step closer to joining it on Cambodia’s nascent stock exchange by announcing plans to register by the end of July. At a ceremony marking the first ...

Despite interest in participating in the stock market, confusion as to how and where to invest in the Cambodia Securities Exchange still persists among many Cambodians without close ties to or backgrounds in trading. After the much-anticipated and long-delayed launch of CSX trading last week, Soun Sokret, an ...

Share prices on the Cambodia Securities Exchange yesterday fell for the first time since trading began a week ago, as technical problems reportedly caused a 90 per cent drop in the amount of shares traded. Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority shares dropped 4.9 per cent to 9,700 riel (US$2.44). The ...

Japan’s Sumi Wiring Systems Co Ltd launched production of automobile wiring this month, a company official said yesterday. Japanese companies such as Sumi and Minebea, a ball-bearings maker, have helped Cambodia’s manufacturing industry diversify away from garments, the country’s main manufacturing product and export, and Prime Minister Hun Sen ...

The tonnage of the Kingdom’s milled-rice exports jumped nearly 50 per cent year-on-year in the first quarter, according to the Ministry of Commerce, with export revenues soaring as much as 82 per cent. Total exports of milled rice for the first three months of 2012 hit ...

Cambodia will no doubt look to partners other than the US and the European Union to bolster its economic growth as those key export markets continue to struggle, a senior International Monetary Fund official says. One way in which Cambodia would forge new and growing relationships with higher-income ...

The price increase for Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority shares maxed out after an hour of trading yesterday morning, the second day of operations on the Cambodia Securities Exchange. PPWSA closed up 4.84 per cent yesterday at 9,750 riel (US$2.44), climbing from 9,300 the day before, ...

The Foreign Trade Bank of Cambodia (FTB) and Tong Yang Securities (Cambodia) yesterday signed a memorandum of understanding on financial consultation services and trade co-operation that is hoped to expand banking and securities business in the country. The MoU should bring the bank and the securities firm into ...

Moody’s Investor Services will review ACLEDA Bank and Cambodian Public Bank (Campu Bank) for potential downgrades, according to a release from the rating agency on Wednesday. But the move comes primarily as a response to the global financial crisis and the rating agency’s attempt to realign sovereign ratings with ...