19 international investors eye opportunities in Portugal’s capital market

A group of 19 international investors will take part in around 100 meetings with 20 companies listed on the Lisbon stock market next week in Portugal as part of Capital Market Day 2024.

The event is organised by Euronext Lisbon and the Association of Lisbon Stock Market Listed Companies and Securities Market Issuers (AEM – Associação de Empresas Emitentes de Valores Cotados em Mercado e a Euronext Lisbon).

The event, the first of its kind held in Portugal, will also include an international conference ‘Invest in Portugal – Insights on an Economy in Transformation’ to be held on 28 June between 9am and 1.30pm at the Lisbon Congress Centre.

During the conference the report ‘Structural Trends Shaping Portugal’s Economy and Growth’ prepared by the Centre for Applied Studies at  Católica Lisbon School of Business and Economics will be presented and which lays out the investment opportunities in Portugal’s economy and Portuguese companies.

All told, 40 investors, 19 of which are overseas investors, will have face-to-face talks with Portuguese company managers and discuss their business activities, strategy, and plans for the future.

“It provides an opportunity for overseas investors to get to know Portugal and its institutions. Two government members will be present (the Minister of the Economy, Pedro Reis and the Minister of Finances, Joaquim Miranda Sarmento) providing an opportunity for international investors to make contact with the new government”, Miguel Athayde Marques, the Board President of AEM told business daily Jornal de Negócios.

The listed companies representative said that there had been a tradition of closeness between investors and listed companies that had been lost, and recalled that before the pandemic there had been a Portugal Day on the New York Stock Exchange and “we want to recapture that moment”, he said.

The day will involve 40 investors and 31 entities including pension funds and investment banks. Invited organisations will come from Spain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, the United States, and India.

“Although the meetings are aimed a listed companies, there is also a number of companies which have joined the initiative because they are interested in exploring the capital market, with Portuguese companies with growth potential which very often is limited by access to capital. In this case the conversations will be informal”, said Miguel Athayde Marques.

Abel Sequeira Ferreira, CEO of AEM called the event a “happy coincidence” because it was a first-of-its-kind meeting that would coincide with the publication of measures to shakeup the market and not only, but also of a tax nature. “It was very important to get such a wide consensus from parliament”, he said, referring to a number of recent tax breaks covering investments in securities announced by the government.

The President of Euronext Lisbon, Isabel Ucha also welcomed that approval in parliament last week for a range of tax incentives aimed at stimulating Portugal’s capital market with agreement from the main political parties.

“This agreement makes is believe that things are moving forward. The government recently took the initiative to introduce tax benefits both in terms of asset-based investors and in relation to market access costs that companies will be able to offset against their taxes and that we naturally see as a good thing and going in the right direction. However, it could have gone further, especially on the side of the investors; but clearly good news, all the same.”