SHANGHAI -- At the end of 2017, the most valuable companies in Asia were, unsurprisingly, Tencent Holdings and Alibaba Group Holding. Reflecting growth in China's internet economy, both companies' market value more than doubled, and were substantially higher than the average of almost 30%. But a closer look at the list of Asia's most valuable companies showed that the same Chinese and Japanese enterprises continued to dominate and there was little by way of new blood from those two countries and elsewhere.
The 50 most valuable Asian stocks in dollar terms by the close of trade on Dec. 29 included 13 telecommunications and information technology companies, accounting for 40% of the total market capitalization of the entities on the list.
