The consensus at MarcumAsia’s "Japan Go IPO" event in Tokyo last week "was that the pipeline of Japanese companies preparing to go global over the next several years is the deepest it has ever been,” said MarcumAsia Co-Chairman Drew Bernstein.

Five years ago, 95% of the business of New York-based accounting and advisory firm MarcumAsia CPAs was in China. Today, “it’s probably 50% or less” at the accounting firm of more than 200 global staff, says co-chairman Drew Bernstein. The rest was largely in Southeast Asia.

Bernstein sees the switch as part of a long-term rise in the importance of a widening swath of Asia for globally minded investors. “My guess is for the next 10 years or so, the majority of the significant industry disruptive unicorns -- and all the M&A that leads up to that -- is going to take place in Asia, not the West,” he said in a recent interview in the New York headquarters of the auditor focused on assisting Asian companies eyeing American listings. “I’ve always had a tremendous amount of confidence in Asia.”

Among individual countries in the region, Bernstein was particularly upbeat about Malaysia, which just this month reported second-quarter GDP growth of 6%, buoyed in part by exports. The country whose population stands at about 34 million also led Southeast Asia with 36 of the region’s total of 47 IPOs, according to the Southeast Asia Mid-Year IPO Snapshot 2026 published by Deloitte.

He was also optimistic about Japan, where MarcumAsia held a “Japan Go IPO Summit” on Sept. 16 that drew more than 600 registrants and 100 Japanese private companies. “The consensus in the room was that the pipeline of Japanese companies preparing to go global over the next several years is the deepest it has ever been,” Bernstein said in emailed comments after the summit.

Overall, Bernstein’s economic outlook was backed up by International Monetary Fund economic forecasts published in July. The fund foresees growth in emerging and developing Asia of 5% this year, better than a global average of 3% and topping the U.S. (2.3%) and Europe (1.3%).

Higher global oil prices from the war in Iran haven’t led to a reduction of the IMF’s global forecast so far, Communications Director Julie Kozack said at a press briefing on Sept. 10. “What we see is that so far, despite six months of war in the Middle East, the global economy has been resilient. It has weathered the shocks, the energy shock in particular, better than feared,” she said. “We have seen some countries take measures to reduce energy demand, and we remain on track for world growth of around three percent.”

Bernstein sees consumers stepping up to help fuel growth in the region in the next decade. As a group, “Asian companies are done being the suppliers. They are becoming the brands. And brands do well in public markets” as a group, he said. Rising per-capita income in developing economies is likely to benefit industries such as education and consumer tech, he said.

Even though Malaysia is not a large country by population relative to India and China, it is attractive to investors in part due to its close proximity to Singapore, the region’s financial hub, Bernstein said. Vietnam, another fast-growing economy, “is coming up and getting more and more interesting,” he added. China IPOs in the U.S. have slowed due to tougher listing rules for businesses from the country, among other factors, he noted.

Though an economic laggard with expected GDP growth of only 0.6% this year, Bernstein was enthusiastic about Japan. “One of the things that makes Japan so popular is confidence in the legal system” as well as its technology firms, he said.

Government speakers at MarcumAsia’s event last week “made clear that national policy is now squarely focused on establishing Japan as a deep tech power capable of rivaling the United States and China, with startup funding, procurement, and regulatory reform all being marshaled toward that goal,” Bernstein said.

“Against that backdrop, four themes ran through every session: Japan’s deep tech and high-growth founders are no longer asking whether a U.S. listing is realistic but how to prepare for one; they are strongly drawn by the valuations and the depth of follow-on financing they see in U.S. markets, which remain difficult to replicate at home; global growth investors, from General Atlantic and Coral Capital to Minerva Growth Partners and DG Ventures, are increasingly willing to underwrite that ambition with late-stage capital and secondary liquidity; and there is no single path to public status, with the IPO, de-SPAC, and direct listing each solving different problems for different companies,” he said.

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Asia Optimist Sees Robust Economic Growth, IPOs In Next Decade