Market Snapshot
The Singapore stock market soared 3.26% this week as persistent inflation continues to weigh on concerns of higher-for-longer rates.
In terms of individual stocks, SIA rose 4.64%; DBS rose 3.99%; UOB rose 4.46%; SingTel rose 2.55%; Sheng Siong rose 2%; Seatrium surged 15.58%; NIO soared 13.85%.
SG Local News
Sea CEO's wife to buy Gallop Road GCB for $42.5 mil
The wife of tech billionaire Forrest Li is set to acquire a mansion in one of Singapore’s most coveted residential areas, even as the luxury property market remains in a lull.
Ma Liqian filed an option in April to buy a so-called good class bungalow on Gallop Road for $42.5 million, according to documents seen by Bloomberg News. The house sits on a 1,552 sqm (16,706 sq ft) plot of land.
Li owns a 1,403 sqm land parcel next to the mansion, near the Singapore Botanic Gardens, a World Heritage Site. That was acquired in 2019, property records show.
Chinese Metal Tycoon’s Heir Buys $62 Million Singapore Mansion
The daughter of a Chinese nickel billionaire purchased a multimillion-dollar mansion in Singapore, adding to the list of wealthy people seizing buying opportunities during the market lull.
Xiang Yangyang, the daughter of Xiang Guangda, who owns Tsingshan Holding Group Co., the world’s largest nickel and stainless steelmaker, agreed to buy the 2,612 square meter (28,111 square foot) house in the country’s Bin Tong Park enclave, according to a property record seen by Bloomberg News.
COE Quota for May-July up 2.7%
THE total Certificate of Entitlement (COE) quota for the period May to July 2024 has increased 2.7 per cent or 397 to 15,104, compared to the preceding three-month period of February to April 2024.
Quotas for the two passenger car categories, A and B, saw small increases, despite less addition to the quota from “cut-and-fill”.
Malaysia to Pilot QR Code at Checkpoints With Singapore
One of the world’s busiest land checkpoints is set to become less congested as Malaysians traveling to Singapore on factory buses will be able to clear immigration through QR code.
Under the new system, workers on factory buses will generate a QR code from a mobile application and officials will scan the code for each traveler. To be implemented in June, the new system applies to immigration complexes linked to the causeways between Singapore and Malaysia’s Johor, Channel News Asia reported, citing Johor’s committee on works, transportation and infrastructure.
Singapore’s inflation eases more than expected in March
Singapore’s March headline and core inflation both eased further than economists expected, data from the Department of Statistics showed on Tuesday (Apr 23).
Headline inflation slowed to 2.7 per cent year on year (yoy), lower than the 3.4 per cent recorded in February, and below the 3.1 per cent median forecast by private-sector economists polled by Bloomberg.
This was also the lowest headline inflation rate since September 2021, when it was 2.5 per cent.
More Singapore F&B businesses expanding overseas
Plans are afoot to help more Singapore food and beverage (F&B) businesses expand overseas.
Food exports have grown at a rate of more than 11 per cent each year since 2020, and they can be found in more than 120 markets worldwide, said Minister of State for Trade and Industry Low Yen Ling, citing figures from Singapore Economic Development Board’s Manufacturing Survey in 2023.
Singapore puts company directors on notice with new proposal
Singapore Exchange Ltd. is proposing a rule change that would make it easier for shareholders to call special general meetings, the latest in an ongoing campaign to improve corporate governance in the city-state.
Under the proposal, companies would have to take steps within 21 days to hold a meeting whenever a shareholder or group of shareholders with at least 10% of paid-up stock makes the request. Boards opposing the demand can do so in court.、
Singapore Dollar Outshines Peers With 40% Advance Under PM Lee
When Lawrence Wong succeeds Lee Hsien Loong as Singapore’s new prime minister next month, he will inherit not only a healthy economy but also robust local assets from a rallying currency to outperforming bonds and stocks.
Since Lee entered office in 2004, the Singapore dollar has risen about 40% against the currencies of the city-state’s major trading partners, more than twice the gain for the US dollar in the same context, Bloomberg-compiled data show. Total returns on Singapore government bonds have outpaced their global peers by around 16 percentage points in the same period.