Singapore's Economic Review Committee, a high-powered task force established by Goh Chok-Tong, prime minister, to shape the country's strategic outlook, has just released its recommendations for bolstering Singapore's role as a global wealth management centre. Some of these recommendations are sweeping.
First, the ERC has concluded that Singapore needs to refocus itself from being a trading centre for foreign exchange and investment banking to become a regional leader in wealth management, global processing and risk management. This is a response to positives such as its ability to attract global fund management firms and private banks.
But it is primarily negative factors that the ERC has highlighted. The shift of economic activity to North Asia has...
