SINGAPORE: Singapore government statutory boards are not
exposed to the structured products and credit notes linked to
bankrupt US investment bank Lehman Brothers.
Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam told Parliament that none
are holding the Lehman Minibonds, Pinnacle Series, DBS High Notes
Five, Merill Lynch Jubilee Series products.
Mr Tharman says four statutory boards - the Civil Service College,
Singapore Land Authority, Infocomm Development Authority and the
Professional Engineers' Board - have invested in other
credit-linked notes.
He says the notes suffered a 14 per cent paper loss this year, not
very different from the recent global market performance.
The exposure of the four boards to such notes make up only 0.05 per
cent of the total investment portfolios of all of Singapore's
statutory boards.
One of the statutory boards also has financial products linked to
credit default swaps, but this makes up only 0.1 per cent of its
portfolio.
Mr Tharman also says the government has advised all the statutory
boards to maintain sound principles of diversification and risk
management when investing.
maybe not lehman but:
If they invest in CDS, this is another time bomb that chance of
it going bust is higher than it is not.
Just look at AIG, CDS are dragging them into an almost
insolvency. If without US treasury they are already DEAD AND
BURY!
if ur wish list is reducing GST for coming budget, forget it.
they are going to try various means to recover their lost and
mistake thru no other than singaporeans!
