Singaporeans have struck the ovarian lottery just by being born in Singapore. No thinking or physical effort required!
Not sure whether its a good or bad thing, but Singaporean investors have one less thing to worry about compared to investors in our neighbouring countries.
We don't have to crack our heads to figure what currencies to put our cash in.
Yes, SGD has weaken against the USD from the low 1.20s plus to the current 1.40s. But you don't hear Singaporeans complaining or worried.
That's because our SGD has strengthened against popular holiday and investment destinations like Japan, Australia, Malaysia, Indonesia, etc.
If you were a Malaysian working in Singapore in the early 70s - when the MYR and SGD were on parity - were you glad you kept most of your cash (retirement savings or opportunity funds) in SGD at our Singapore banks?
Just make a wild guess why the wealthy Indonesians like to come to Singapore
to purchase Life insurance policies denominated in either SGD or USD?
Investors from an emerging countries may have lost money with their investments in Singapore properties on a nominal basis, but after currency conversion back to their home currencies, they may still come out on top!
Perhaps that's why Singapore has a thriving private banking sector? The rich in Asia not only have to decide what currencies to put their cash and/or assets in, they also have to decide where to store them.
Now, is it a good thing to have all our cash in a single currency?
Singapore Man of Leisure (welcome to my blog; just google it!
