Singapore’s central bank has banned some of the city-state’s biggest financial institutions from selling structured notes after they improperly marketed US$367 million of the bonds that were linked to Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.
The 10 banks and brokerages can’t sell structured notes for between six months and two years, the Monetary Authority of Singapore said in a statement late on Tuesday.
The 10 banned financial institutions are: DBS Group, UOB Kay Hian, OCBC Securities, ABN AMRO’s Singapore branch, Maybank Singapore, CIMB-GK Securities, Hong Leong Finance, DMG Partners, Phillip Securities and Kim Eng Securities.
The central bank said some of the institutions assigned risk ratings that were inconsistent with warnings stated in the prospectus for the notes, and salespeople were ill trained to sell the notes.
The Lehman collapse last fall led to a default on the dividend payment of some of the bonds, most of which had a maturity of five to seven years and a yield of about 5 percent.
About 10,000 investors bought S$520 million (US$367 million) of the notes, and financial institutions have compensated about 4,000 of them, the central bank said.
Similar structured notes were sold in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Indonesia.
CASINO DELAYED
Meanwhile, the opening of Singapore’s first casino has been put back several months because of shortages of labor and materials, the chairman of developer Las Vegas Sands said yesterday.
Sheldon Adelson said Marina Bay Sands would open early next year for its initial phase, after being originally due to welcome its first visitors by the end of this year.
“The opening date we seriously anticipate will be in January or February,” Adelson said at a ceremony marking the finishing of construction of the development’s three 55-story hotel towers.
“We can’t control the flow of sand to make concrete with, we can’t control the availability of steel ... and we can’t control the availability of labor due to other projects that are in the market,” he said.
Adelson yesterday put the total cost of the development at S$8 billion.
GEARING UP: An invasion would be difficult and would strain China’s forces, but it has conducted large-scale training supporting an invasion scenario, the report said China increased its military pressure on Taiwan last year and took other steps in preparation for a potential invasion, an annual report published by the US Department of Defense on Wednesday showed. “Throughout 2023, Beijing continued to erode longstanding norms in and around Taiwan by employing a range of pressure tactics against Taiwan,” the report said, which is titled “Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China (PRC) 2024.” The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) “is preparing for a contingency to unify Taiwan with the PRC by force, if perceived as necessary by Beijing, while simultaneously deterring, delaying or denying
‘ONE BRIDGE’: The US president-elect met with Akie Abe on Dec. 15 in Florida and the two discussed a potential Taiwan-China conflict’s implications for world peace US president-elect Donald Trump has described Taiwan as “a major issue for world peace” during a meeting with Akie Abe, the widow of late Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe, Japanese newspaper the Yomiuri Shimbun quoted sources as saying in a report yesterday. Trump met with Akie Abe on Dec. 15 at the Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, where the two discussed the Russo-Ukrainian war and the situation in the Taiwan Strait. During the meeting, Trump spoke on the implications for world peace of a potential Taiwan-China conflict, which “indicated his administration’s stance of placing importance on dealing with the situation in
QUICK LOOK: The amendments include stricter recall requirements and Constitutional Court procedures, as well as a big increase in local governments’ budgets Portions of controversial amendments to tighten requirements for recalling officials and Constitutional Court procedures were passed by opposition lawmakers yesterday following clashes between lawmakers in the morning, as Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) members tried to block Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators from entering the chamber. Parts of the Public Officials Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法) and Constitutional Court Procedure Act (憲法訴訟法) passed the third reading yesterday. The legislature was still voting on various amendments to the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) as of press time last night, after the session was extended to midnight. Amendments to Article 4
ALLIANCE: Washington continues to implement its policy of normalizing arms sales to Taiwan and helps enhance its defense, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said US President Joe Biden on Friday agreed to provide US$571.3 million in defense support for Taiwan, the White House said, while the US State Department approved the potential sale of US$265 million in military equipment. Biden had delegated to the secretary of state the authority “to direct the drawdown of up to US$571.3 million in defense articles and services of the Department of Defense, and military education and training, to provide assistance to Taiwan,” the White House said in a statement. However, it did not provide specific details about this latest package, which was the third of its kind to
RSS