MANILA, Feb. 24 (Xinhua) -- Stock exchanges in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have agreed on a regional mechanism that will route orders from brokers directly to the local exchanges, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) said Tuesday.

    The ASEAN Common Exchange Gateway alliance is expected to help pave the way for the future development of back-end linkages involving clearing, settlement, and depositary arrangements, ADB said.

    The new alliance comes three weeks after ASEAN capital markets regulators agreed on a road map to fully integrate ASEAN capital markets by 2015.

    The agreement will initially involve five countries -- Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand, with each listing their top 30 stocks on a single computer screen, known as the ASEAN Bulletin Board.

    Other ASEAN countries are expected to join later.

    "None of the ASEAN exchanges is individually large, but together they will have the scale and liquidity to be globally competitive," said Jaseem Ahmed, Director, Financial Sector and Public Management Division in ADB's Southeast Asia Department.

    He said the initiative will create the market infrastructure and regionally focused products and intermediaries to promote ASEAN as an asset class and allow distribution of listed products on ASEAN exchanges.