Wong sees it this way: this $5 billion has helped move the market, but the impetus is not from this pool of funds alone. There are both push and pull factors, including Singapore’s perceived attractiveness relative to the US, Hong Kong and China, he says.
For the two decades to September 2024, Samuel Wong of OCBC has used one term to describe the Singapore market: extremely boring. “It is low beta; it is not moving,” says Wong, referring to the annualised returns of just 3% or so, and double that, when dividends were included.
However, that has since changed, and significantly so, says Wong, who is the bank’s senior trading strategist for its global markets equity research team. Thanks to the concerted efforts led by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), primarily through the $5 billion Equity Market Development Programme (EQDP) funds, the market has finally breached its previous record and has continued to chart new highs since.
