Dear readers, yesterday, the government announced a $5 billion MAS scheme through which MAS will partner with selected fund managers to invest in Singapore stocks.
This is good news for the Singapore stocks markets and I believe this measure, is to-date one of the most high-level and highly capital-intensive effort to boost the local bourse.
I read that there are three broad pillars for the recommendations by the committee to uplift our local equities markets: Supply, Demand, Connectivity/Trading.
The $5 billion MAS scheme is part of the efforts under the Demand plank.
Among the measures under the Supply plank is the effort of the tax incentives to attract corporate and fund manager listings in Singapore as was announced last week.
And finally, on the Connectively/Trading plank, I read that there will be measures to develop cross-border partnerships and make trading and settlement more efficient.
I hope through the proposed measures by the Review Committee, Singapore stocks markets will become a more vibrant stock exchange with sustained opportunities for wealth creation through investment in Singapore stocks for our retail investors. We should no longer have repeats of the S-chip scandals, spate of untenable small-chip companies that are forced to delist and leave investors at a capital loss, amidst others. And I sincerely hope that the Straits Times Index can prove that Singapore stocks markets can grow beyond the physical size constraint of Singapore.