Top Headlines in the Last 7 Days (9th – 15th Oct 2017)

DBS has hired Taimur Baig as Chief Economist and Managing Director for Group Research, replacing David Carbon who will be retiring.  He will report to Timothy Wong, Managing Director and Head of DBS Group Research.

Taimur joins from Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), where he was the Principal Economist at the Economic Policy Group.  Prior, he was with Deutsche Bank as Managing Director & Chief Economist for Asia, and International Monetary Fund as Senior Economist.  He holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and attended Wabash College and the London School of Economics for his B.A. Learn More …

No. 3 Singapore Life Launches New Suite of Life Insurance Products

Singapore Life, the first independent insurer in Singapore to be licensed since 1970, has launched a new suite of life insurance products.  The new insurance products are Term Life and Critical Illness plans, vanilla term insurance, a deliberate departure from the many new products in the market compounded with various interesting, but equally complicated features.

Singapore Life features robust digital robo-underwriting and identity verification capabilities that dynamically expedites the application and approval process.  The purchase journey with Singapore Life is intuitive and secure, can be done without another person’s assistance, and is usually free of the hassle of going for a medical test.  Learn more …

No. 4 SVCA Celebrates 25th Anniversary, Reports $7.8 Billion in Private Investments for 2017

More than US$7.8 billion have already been invested in only the first 8 months of 2017 by Private Equity, Venture Capital and Strategic Investors in Southeast Asia.

The US$7.8 billion invested, has already surpassed the total investments of 2016, announced by Dr Thomas Lanyi, Chairman of SVCA at the Singapore Venture Capital and Private Equity Association (SVCA).

On 12th October 2017, SVCA commemorated its 25th Anniversary and held its 8th SCVA Annual Awards alongside the gala dinner at the Shangri-La Hotel in Singapore.  Below is the list of 2017 SCVA Awards Winners:  Learn More …

No. 5 Lion Global Investors and Phillip Capital Jointly Launch ETF focusing on Singapore’s REITs 

Lion Global Investors and Phillip Capital Management jointly launched ETF that focus on Singapore’s REITs.  The initial offer period will be from 2nd to 20th of October 2017, and can be applied through participating dealers.

The Exchanged-Traded Fund known as Lion-Phillip S-REIT ETF, aims to provide investors with low-cost access to high-quality S-REITs1 that offer a sustainable income stream and potential capital growth.  The benchmark is the Morningstar® Singapore REIT Yield Focus IndexSM.

Lion Global Investors is one of the largest asset management companies in Southeast Asia, with group assets under management of S$42.5 billion while PhillipCapital, founded in 1975, has assets under custody/management totals to more than USD 30 Billion. Learn More …