SINGAPORE: Young investors in Singapore are turning their attention to the local market as they look for stability amid global market uncertainty.
The heightened interest is part of a broader homeward shift that brokerages are observing among their investor base.
Joshua Chim, general manager of investment platform FSM Global Singapore, said Singapore investors are refocusing their attention on local stocks amid rising geopolitical uncertainty in the United States, a falling US dollar, and the strong performance of Singapore equities in 2025.
He added that tensions in the Middle East have underscored Singapore and the Singaporean dollar’s appeal as safe-haven assets.
Hubert Lim, a fourth-year accountancy and business student at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), is one of those investors turning homewards.
Lim, who invests globally, has not bought into Singapore stocks yet and plans to start by buying shares in small and mid-cap companies he sees as having long-term growth potential.
“My capital is quite small, so I am focusing on high-growth stocks first,” he said.
Lim could get some investment ideas from iEdge Singapore Next 50 indexes.
The indexes track the 50 largest listed companies outside the 30 blue-chip constituents of the Straits Times Index.
Among the 50 stocks are supermarket chain Sheng Siong, medical technology company UltraGreen.ai, semiconductor plays UMS and Frencken, accommodation owner and operator Centurion, and transport operator ComfortDelGro.
Lim is not ruling out larger-cap stocks, which could form the income-generation portion of his portfolio, such as the three local banks.
Ocean Cheng and Dary Ong, both third-year banking and finance students at Ngee Ann Polytechnic, invested in Singapore stocks for the stability and dividend payouts.
Cheng said Singapore’s strong economic fundamentals, political stability and a resilient currency are factors in its favour.
However, he noted that Singapore equities often trade at lower multiples than stocks in the United States and other regional markets.
Furthermore, liquidity – the ease of buying and selling – remains an important consideration, so Cheng prefers to stay diversified, with his portfolio more heavily allocated to the United States and European markets than to Singapore.
Ong noted that Singapore equities generally have strong governance and transparent regulations on top of consistent dividend payouts.
The local market thus provides young investors with a reliable foundation for long-term investing, he said.
Ong also invests in the United States through broad-based exchange-traded funds (ETFs) such as the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF. In February 2025, the Monetary Authority of Singapore launched the Equity Market Development Programme (EQDP), a S$6.5bil initiative designed to boost investor participation beyond the large-cap stocks.
Eric Xiao, head of sales (Asia) at CMC Markets, said the EQDP marked the inflexion point for Singapore’s equity markets.
He added that before the programme was launched, trading on CMC’s platform was “narrow and bank-heavy”.
Since its launch, investors are buying a wider range of Singapore stocks than before, with the fourth quarter of 2025 registering the broadest breadth of trade, he said.
“Investors are building thematic positions across industrials, technology, and property-adjacent names, not just parking capital in the three banks,” said Xiao.
He added that the expansion of the EQDP in February signals a “sustained, structural commitment”, which may give retail investors more confidence to stay invested in the local markets.
In a healthy market, information is accessible, and investors make decisions based on known facts.
The onus is on investors to cut through the noise, which includes hype, news headlines and analyst opinions, and focus on the company fundamentals.
Daniel Ong, whose portfolio roughly comprises 60% US stocks and 40% Singapore stocks, said hype may surface ideas, but he does not follow these ideas blindly.
“I have to see whether it is reasonable for me to buy the stock,” the second-year banking and finance student at Singapore Polytechnic added.
Lim from NTU finds out more about the companies he wants to invest in by doing his own research.
He does not rely only on research reports because these reports are widely available and if everyone were to read the same reports, no one would have an edge over the others.
All of them would be taking the same action, as recommended by the report.
Moreover, Lim said his advantage comes from his own research, using artificial intelligence to surface company- and stock-specific information and to form his own opinions.
“Building a clear thesis – what do I think about a company, why do I want to own its stock – makes a lot of difference,” he further added.
“What do I see in this company that other investors do not see?” — The Straits Times/ANN
