Market Snapshot
Singapore stocks opened higher on Wednesday. STI rose 0.42%, CityDev rose 0.85%, Frasers Property fell 1.18%, UOB rose 0.51%, OCBC rose 0.58%.
Stocks to Watch
City Developments Ltd (CDL), Frasers Property: A consortium of five companies, including CDL and Frasers Property, has submitted two bids with different concept proposals for the master-developer site in Jurong Lake District. The two property developers will take a 25 per cent stake each in the consortium.
WING Tai has priced S$100 million in fixed-rate senior unsecured notes due Apr 3, 2029, at 4.38 per cent. Coupon payments will be made semi-annually.
The notes were issued under the property developer’s S$1 billion multicurrency debt-issuance programme established on Mar 6.
Net proceeds from the issuance will be used to finance working capital requirements and investments, and to refinance existing borrowings.
UOB on Tuesday (Mar 26) announced two new appointments to its management team. Kelvin Ng, who is deputy head of group global markets, will take over as head of group global markets from Apr 1. He replaces Leslie Foo, who is retiring. Adaline Zheng, who was head of wholesale banking and alternate chief executive officer (CEO) at UOB China, took over as CEO of UOB’s Hong Kong branch on Mar 25.
Sabana Reit trustee: HSBC Institutional Trust Services’ first meeting with the internalisation committee of Sabana Industrial Real Estate Investment Trust did not take place as intended on Monday (Mar 25), as the committee members did not attend the event.
SG Local News
Singapore’s Factory Output Extends Growth in February
Singapore’s factory output grew 3.8 per cent on year in February, extending gains from January’s revised figure of 0.6 per cent growth, data from the Economic Development Board (EDB) showed on Tuesday (Mar 26).
February’s performance was better than expected by private-sector economists, who predicted a muted 0.5 per cent expansion in a Bloomberg poll.
Excluding the volatile biomedical manufacturing cluster, output grew by 1.4 per cent year on year in February, easing from the 4.7 per cent growth posted in January.
Prices of Singapore GCBs, Luxury Apartments Remain Stable
Although transaction volumes for luxury apartments and Good Class Bungalows (GCBs) were lower in the second half of 2023, prices for these segments remained stable, said CBRE on Tuesday (Mar 26).
There were nine GCB transactions worth S$202.05 million in H2 2023, down 64.9 per cent versus the S$575.27 million from 14 GCB transactions in the previous six-month period. The latest sales figure was also about a third of the S$613.45 million transacted in H2 2022.
OCBC Aims to Quadruple Number of Cross-Border QR Payments in 2024
OCBC announced on Tuesday (Mar 26) that it expects to facilitate 250,000 cross-border QR payments this year, four times the number of such transactions in 2023.
The bank said in a statement that it has integrated five cross-border payment platforms into its digital app in the last 12 months.
These include Alipay+, UnionPay International, Thailand’s PromptPay, Malaysia’s DuitNow, and Indonesia’s Quick Response Indonesian Standard.