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🇸🇬 Singapore /Economy & Trade

Singapore’s Global Investment Talent Push Faces a Bigger Test: Can It Lift Locals Into Top Roles?

From CNA · () English

Translated from English and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

Analysis Named sources Context piece
  • Singapore is trying to attract senior global investment professionals to expand its asset management industry and build teams around them.
  • The industry employs nearly 25,000 people, about 80% of them locals, but observers say the biggest shortage is at the most senior level.
  • The strategy’s success will depend on whether local workers gain the experience needed to move into senior roles, rather than simply whether it creates jobs.

Singapore’s effort to bring leading investment professionals from around the world to its shores faces a more demanding test than attracting jobs. The crucial question is whether their expertise can help Singaporeans move into the industry’s most senior positions.

The country hopes to anchor experienced portfolio managers and other specialists in Singapore, then build investment teams and related businesses around them. Kher Sheng Lee, co-head for Asia Pacific at the Alternative Investment Management Association, compared senior investment professionals to “race car drivers”. But, he said, “The jobs are in the garage, the corporate offices, the research labs.”

The jobs are in the garage, the corporate offices, the research labs.

· Kher Sheng LeeHe used the racing-team analogy to explain that senior investment hires can generate jobs across a much broader ecosystem.

Those jobs include analysts, traders, risk and compliance specialists, and operations and technology staff. Fund administrators, prime brokers, lawyers and auditors also form part of the wider ecosystem. Singapore’s asset management industry employs close to 25,000 people, with locals making up about 80% of the workforce.

The talent we're looking at is very scarce. Scarcity at the very top of the game is a global challenge.

· Kher Sheng LeeHe described the global competition for highly experienced investment professionals.

The challenge, observers say, is not a broad lack of finance professionals. It is the scarcity of people at the very top, who combine specialised expertise with long investment records. Financial centres such as New York and London are competing for the same limited pool. “The talent we're looking at is very scarce. Scarcity at the very top of the game is a global challenge,” Lee said.

He said investing also requires the temperament to make difficult decisions under pressure, because professionals handle other people’s savings and investments. Those qualities can take years and several market cycles to develop. Lawrence Loh of the National University of Singapore Business School described the strategy as “anchor first and then multiply after”. The next test is whether local staff working alongside these global hires turn that exposure into advancement.

anchor first and then multiply after

· Lawrence LohHe characterized Singapore’s strategy of attracting senior professionals and building a wider sector around them.
About this summary

Originally published by CNA in English. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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