Many policies focus on trying to achieve a bumiputra share of corporate equity, comprising at least 30% of the total.

In Brazil, foreign investors still cannot buy corporate equities without creating a local company with a local investment adviser.

Also, 40% of the Philippines' national corporate equity is owned by the ethnic Chinese.

Only one thing has changed: the portion of corporate equities held by mutual funds.

Close relationships also exist in West Germany, where banks own an estimated 15 percent of all corporate equities.

But such indexation ought to be reserved for future investments and only for corporate equity.

Funds, meanwhile, have also increased the marketability of corporate equity.

The corporate equities, or stocks, included two banks and a tobacco company.

The firm reported that trading revenues from government securities, "junk bonds," corporate equities, money market products and other financial instruments increased significantly.

Indeed, the return on corporate equity in Japan averages a miserable 4 percent - one-quarter the rate in America.