The Singapore Financial System: An Analysis Of The Singapore Financial System

1070 Words3 Pages

The Singapore financial system is one of the largest financial centres in the world. It is built around a core of domestic and international banks, and offers a wide range of services. It is highly developed, well-regulated and supervised as the authorities have given strong emphasis to integrity and stability in finance whilst complying with international standards
Strengths
Banks
Monetary policies issued by the bank aim to achieve “price stability conducive to obtaining sustainable growth of the economy.” This is done by managing the exchange rate using a basket-band crawl (BBC) approach. MAS intervenes in both foreign exchange and domestic market operations that are aimed at managing systemic liquidity when necessary, and banks are required …show more content…

Profitability is high and diversified. Asset quality is good and NPLs are low and well provisioned. Financial soundness indicators for the three main domestic banks remained strong even during the global and European crises. Stress tests suggest that banks are resilient against numerous unfavourable macroeconomic scenarios as their high capitalization can offset potential losses.
At present, MAS requires banks to hold liquid assets equivalent to 16 percent of qualifying liabilities, However, supervisors can enforce a higher or lower requirement based on the bank’s risk …show more content…

Systemically important payment systems include the large value payment system MEPS+ and securities and derivatives clearing and settlement systems operated by the Singapore Exchange (SGX). Two financial central counterparty clearing house (CCPs) are the Central Depository (Pte) Limited (CDP) that clears equities and corporate debt securities; and the Singapore Exchange Derivatives Clearing Limited (SGX-DC) that clears exchange traded and OTC derivatives. CDP’s value of transactions processed was equivalent to 94 percent of GDP in 2012. Worldwide, SGX- DC is the eighth largest clearer in exchange traded equity index futures. Singapore is also one of the largest trading centres for OTC derivatives in Asia. CDP and SGX-DC are assessed as effective and efficient CCPs with sound risk management frameworks. Both CCPs comply with relevant international standards. They are guided by SGX’s comprehensive and transparent risk management framework comprising clear policies, sound governance arrangements and operational systems, accompanied with business continuity procedures that are regularly tested. The CCPs apply a comprehensive credit risk management framework which serves to maintain sufficient financial resources to cover the default of the clearing member and its affiliates with the largest exposure, as well as the default of the two financially weakest clearing members. However, SGX’s

Open Document