Singapore update #7: 28 January 2026
It is shaping up to be another good year for Singapore, and this newsletter.
We are still waiting for EDB’s year in review document, which should gleefully report FDI numbers now swelled by Micron’s new 24 billion commitment to Singapore.
Micron’s investment will cascade through the value chain. We believe that, in typically inefficient fashion, many Singaporean names have yet to appropriately reprice.
Precision Engineering
Iqbal and I are noticing strength across the precision engineering value chain.
Soon Lian Holdings is an aluminium supplier that has closed its discount to book value this year, on no news from the company. Though they also have marine and aerospace customers, their two previous profit warnings credited the semiconductor industry, which we believe is a reference to front end semicap.
Singapore and Malaysia are key manufacturing hubs for Applied Materials and Lam Research, both levered to memory capex.
I believe our friends in Singapore have known about the Micron Nand Fab expansion a week before it was announced yesterday. Alternatively, SL’s results due in late Feb have already been leaked.
These results should provide a read through for our favourite precision engineering idea. The further upstream in the semicap value chain, the earlier you’d expect to see great results.
Another example is KFM Kingdom, a supplier of metal stamping tools (i.e. equipment that shapes flat sheets of metal into parts). Their stock is up 50% in the last week, also on no news.
After a strong 2025, Singapore’s BCA sees equally strong construction demand in 2026 (PR)
Building and Construction Authority (BCA) projecting total construction demand to remain steady at S$47-53 billion in nominal terms for 2026, similar to 2025
Over the medium-term, construction demand is projected to reach an average of between $39 billion and $46 billion per year from 2027 to 2030. Besides the Changi T5 development and HDB’s Build-To-Order construction, medium term construction demand is anticipated to be supported by a strong pipeline of various large developments such as the redevelopment of NUH at Kent Ridge, various Junior Colleges, and the development of the new Singapore University of Social Sciences (SUSS) City Campus.
We expect this will be followed by bullish analyst reports on the construction sector, such as this one from CGSI.
Civil engineering company Huationg is up 28% YTD, while crane company Tiong Woon is up 23% YTD.
Huationg has proposed a placement of 7% new shares at an 8% discount.
Majority shareholders of Reclaims Global, a demolitions and excavations company, completed a sale of shares to various institutions and family offices yesterday.
Kwan Yong Holdings catching bids yesterday: +12.5%.
The under-appreciated point about the PR is that the BCA is calling out projects from the Housing Development Board, Ministry of Health, and Ministry of Education. All of these government bodies are fans of KYH.
CTR Holdings still a laggard despite:
Having a history of working on Ministry of Health projects.
Possibly also being involved in the Micron NAND fab expansion. Paid subscribers will have an update on this next week.
700 MW of data centers to be built on Jurong Island.
Their customer Obayashi being awarded a contract for a new MRT station, with many more tenders yet to be awarded. Again, paid subs will get an update next week.
Singapore studying more MRT lines:
Singapore’s Business Times launches “Business Times Global” with the ambition of better reporting on South-east Asia (BT)
This newsletter has often lamented the opportunity squandered by the Singaporean financial press to corner the SE Asia market, ceding that ground to Nikkei Asia.
We’re looking forward to complementing BT’s renewed effort to cover the region.
On a different note, Korean banks have been outperforming Singapore banks. YTD:
SHG +12.4%
WF +10%
vs
DBS +5%
OCBC +8%
UOB +9%
Jeju bank is going ballistic for some reasons