NEWS

Family offices in Singapore show growing interest in nature-friendly investments

SINGAPORE – Nature conservation, usually funded by governments and philanthropic organisations, is getting a new source of support – family offices in Singapore.

Some of these private wealth management advisory firms that serve high-net-worth families have expressed growing interest in nature-friendly impact investments.

This comes amid growing calls by the United Nations for financial institutions, governments and the private sector to step up financing for nature conservation.

Some private wealth management advisory firms that serve high-net-worth families have expressed growing interest in nature-friendly impact investments. BT FILE PHOTO

There were 1,400 single-family offices that qualified for tax incentives as of the end of 2023, a rise of 27% from the end of 2022, the latest official figures show. © AP

Singapore sets response deadline for family office applications

SINGAPORE — Singapore’s financial regulator is pushing family office applicants to respond promptly to scrutiny, or risk having their efforts to obtain tax breaks rendered fruitless, as the Southeast Asian financial center tightens procedures around foreign wealth inflows in the wake of a massive money laundering bust.

According to three industry sources with knowledge of the matter, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) will give a maximum of one month for applicants to reply to the regulator when it asks for additional information. In the past, no hard deadline was given. Going forward, applications are set to be disregarded if the deadline is not met.

Singapore family office applicants face 18-month wait amid tighter scrutiny

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The global queue to set up a family office in Singapore has stretched to as long as 18 months, with a backlog of wealthy investors encountering stricter new regulations in the Asian financial hub. Family offices boomed during the pandemic and have come to symbolise Singapore’s ambitions as an investment destination, but are under additional scrutiny after the city-state’s biggest money laundering probe. The number of Singapore-registered family offices, which manage tens of billions of dollars of private wealth, has leapt from just 50 in 2018 to 1,100 at the end of 2022, according to the Monetary Authority of Singapore. But lawyers and advisers involved in setting up family offices said the pace of new registrations has slowed, with demand now falling as processing times stretch from less than six months to in some cases as long as 18 months.