Indonesia Lures Foreign Funds

Indonesian state firms are courting foreign pension funds by offering a share in future revenue from toll roads, power stations and other infrastructure projects, as part of a presidential drive to secure $10 billion in additional inflows, Reuters reported. The state budget is not enough to fund President Joko Widodo’s ambitious plan to expand infrastructure in Southeast Asia’s biggest economy, a sprawling archipelago where the costs of moving goods around are among Asia’s highest. Widodo told Reuters this week that he had instructed ministers to market the country aggressively to investors, capitalizing on Standard & Poor’s May 19 upgrade of its credit rating to investment grade.