Saturday, July 11, 2009

Serangoon North HUDC Privatisation

Dear Mr Tan,
Hope you can post this article in your blog site. Hopefully someone out there may be able to offer the residents in Serangoon North HUDC estate some ideas on how they can proceed from the present jam they are in.
Aik Theng Chong

Friday, July 10, 2009

Idling ships clog up Singapore shores

The global economy is still bad and will take some time to recover. Read this report.
I hope that the Government will consider new ways to create jobs for the unemployed and school leavers. The old ways will not work. My suggestions are stated here.




Thursday, July 9, 2009

Rebuttals to editorial in Straits Times

Dear Kin Lian
I was very upset with the editorial in today ST because the editorial is full of errors. I am wondering if you will be putting up a rebuttal in your blog on this article.

It is easy to rebute the factual inaccuracy of the article (rebuttals in bold italic)

> Unfortunately, Lehman brothers turns out to be a company in their basket of "reference entities" - this is not the case
> 10 FIs here weren't selling anything that was unknown to tetail investors. Hundreds of varieties were sold during boom years - this is not the case
> Many investors happily pocketed returns much higher than what could be earned in comparable time deposits - this is not the case
> A fine that is unduly large will raise alarm bells over the fairness with which Singapore's internationally oriented financial sector is run, especially given the difficulties of assign blame in this matter - in HK, financial institutions voluntarily proposed that they compensate ALL investors a minimum 60% to 70% of their invested amount.

There are many more errors that you could probably can point out than me.

S

Issues not addressed by MAS investigation findings

Dear Mr. Tan,

I am disappointed that the MAS investigation findings did not address the following issues:

1) Are minibond products suitable for the retail investors?
2) Are ordinary investors with education level above primary 6 able to comprehend the complexity of the prospectus?
3) Are minibond products defective?
4) Whether minibond products are fair with respect to the return and risk?
5) Whether the newspaper advertisements misled the investors into believing that minibond is a bond from the six leading banks?
6) Whether the sales brochures misled the investors into believing that it is a bond from the six leading banks?
7) Whether the prospectus confusing and/or misleading?
8) Whether the sales brochures and prospectus omitting any important information?
9) Whether conflicts of interest arise: can Lehman alone being the arranger, issuer and swap counterparty?

Thank You,
P

Law Suit on DBS High Notes

SINGAPORE, July 10 (Reuters) - More than 200 customers have sued Singapore's DBS Bank, a unit of DBS Group Holdings , in a bid to recover investment losses of around S$17 million ($11.6 million) arising from the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the Straits Times reported on Friday.

Siraj Omar, a director at Premier Law, told Reuters his firm had filed a claim in a Singapore court on behalf of 204 investors but declined to discuss the case. The investors had purchased a callable basket of credit-linked notes, called High Notes 5, from DBS.

A DBS spokeswoman confirmed receipt of the claim, saying the suit was without merit and that DBS planned to defend the lawsuit.

Coverage of Lehman cases in Hong Kong

Hi Mr. Tan,
Why is there no coverage of what is happening with the Lehman cases in Hong Kong in our newspapers? Surely, this is relevant to the investors in Singapore, to know what is happening to similar cases in HK. The main source of this information is your blog - thank G!

REPLY
I want to thank a volunteer who seaches the online version of the Hong Kong newspapers every day and sends the articles to me. Without his help (and he did it without my asking), I would not be able to put up these news clippings. My job is to check that they are relevant to the readers.

I wish that our daily newspapers would be active in covering the developments in Hong Kong. This is what a free and independent media should do. I hope that they will be more active in this coverage in the future.

MySudoku Contest in MyPaper

I have partnered with MyPaper to start MySudoku contest. It will appear on Friday from 4 weeks, starting today. The rules are listed here. Several entries have already been submitted by SMS within 30 minutes this morning.

The prize is TKL Sudoku Vol 1. It can be purchased here.