Sector Focus
15 Mar 2019
SINGAPORE (Mar 15): After acquiring its rivals to become Europe’s largest and the world’s second-largest brewery company in recent years, Heineken International is now seeking growth by expanding its sizeable beer portfolio to include the fledgling, yet fast-growing, non-alcoholic beer segment.
Heineken 0.0 is the non-intoxicating, low calorie answer to the company’s namesake beer. ...
SINGAPORE (Mar 13): The catastrophic slump of Singapore’s much-vaunted water and power company, Hyflux Ltd., has stunned 34,000 retail investors who were lured by the promise of a 6% annual return forever from a company that seemed to have a gold seal of government approval.
At the heart of the debacle is Tuaspring, a desalination and power plant that cost $1.1 billion and was heralded as ...
SINGAPORE (Mar 5): Oxford Economics says the prospects of Northeast Asian economies, which are uniquely exposed to the ongoing global electronics slowdown, are not as bleak as they seem.
This is due to trade diversion’s partial mitigation of the impact of US-China trade tensions as well as limited direct competition between China and other Northeast Asian economies in the high-value field of ...
26 Feb 2019
SINGAPORE (Feb 26): Singapore's three largest banks by assets, DBS Bank, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp (OCBC) and United Overseas Bank (UOB) will face greater asset risks this year due to worsening macroeconomic conditions despite ending 2018 with record net profits, stable asset quality and strong capital, says Moody’s Investors Service.
This, combined, with the stagnation of net interest ...
SINGAPORE (Feb 22): After being stung by the market turmoil at the end of last year, Singapore’s banks are bracing for fresh challenges from China-US trade tensions and a slowing world economy.
“We expect ongoing global uncertainties to continue to weigh on business sentiment in the near term,” United Overseas Bank Chief Executive Officer Wee Ee Cheong told reporters Friday in Singapore ...
SINGAPORE (Feb 18): Huawei Technologies Co and the 5G, or fifth-generation, mobile network has been grabbing headlines. US secretary of state Mike Pompeo is reported to have warned European countries that using technology from Huawei could harm their relationship with the US. In Singapore, M1 and Huawei have been in 5G trials together. If M1 is privatised, the spotlight is likely to fall on ...
SINGAPORE (Feb 7): DBS Bank is No. 34 in Brand Finance’s Banking 500 2019 annual report global rankings, rising six spots from No. 40 in 2018 and making it Asean’s ‘Most Valuable Bank Brand” for the 7th straight year.
Brand Finance is an independent brand valuation and strategy consultancy. Its annual Banking 500 study ranks the world’s most valuable and strongest banking brands ...
SINGAPORE (Feb 1): Indonesia wants to re-position its Batam island as an alternative shipping and manufacturing hub to Singapore with a potential to draw US$60 billion ($80.8 billion) in new investment.
Batam and nearby islands -- located at less than 30 kilometers south of Singapore -- have attracted about US$20 billion dollars of investment and they were declared a free-trade zone in 2007. ...
SINGAPORE (Jan 17): Zuji, an Asian online travel booking site, is no longer operational after failing to renew licenses in Hong Kong and Singapore and an air ticketing system terminated its services.
Zuji’s business permits expired Jan. 9 and the firm hasn’t applied for fresh ones, Hong Kong’s Travel Agents Registry said in an email, while Singapore Tourism Board said that Zuji’s ...
08 Jan 2019
SINGAPORE (Jan 8): OCBC Bank is expecting Singapore office REITs to strengthen further in the near-term this year – and possibly, in the process, demand higher rents to bring about positive rental reversion.
In a Tuesday report, OCBC’s credit research team highlights office REITs as a bright spot among Singapore REITs (S-REITs), with the recent trend of strong new office supply looking to ...