Singapore: Moves announced to boost Asian infrastructure financing
Source: Asia Insurance Review | Aug 2018
Singapore Property & Casualty Regulation
Singapore is developing two significant initiatives to facilitate the take-off of Asian infrastructure financing, MAS managing director Ravi Menon has said.
At a recent investment forum, he said that one initiative is to create investment benchmarks to make infrastructure an investable asset class. This will allow investors to compare the returns of privately-held infrastructure debt and equity against other asset classes.
The second initiative is an infrastructure debt distribution facility to help crowd-in institutional investors.
“We are working with industry partners to securitise a pool of brownfield regional project finance loans from banks into a collateralised loan obligation that institutional investors, including insurance companies and pension funds, can invest in,” Mr Menon said.
Singapore has also set up Infrastructure Asia: a go-to knowledge centre for infrastructure players and investors in Asian infrastructure. The office will facilitate infrastructure investment and financing.
These measures are seen as facilitating investments as insurers and other investors turn increasingly to alternative assets in the search for higher yield. In addition, project financing is expected to surge particularly with China’s Belt and Road Initiative. A