ASEAN Is Looking Like A ‘China 2.0 Play’

By Harry G. Broadman (original source Forbes) 

“Even before the Chinese economy’s long-standing serious structural problems were exposed over the last couple of years, investors started to wake up to the reality that other countries in East Asia are increasingly attractive destinations—perhaps, in some cases, as alternatives to China.

If anything, that interest has been growing steadily, with much of the attention centered on the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), which was formed in 1967 and currently consists of 10 countries: Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Myanmar, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. The formal establishment of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) in November 2015 has intensified the attraction. The AEC seeks to create an integrated market that would comprise the equivalent of about 50% of China’s population and whose total annual inflows of foreign direct investment in 2013 actually overtook China’s.”

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