AsiaBiz Strategy

28/07/2025

Singapore Incorporation Services – Start Your Business with Confidence

27/07/2025

Growing your business in Asia with our Business Consulting guidance

27/07/2025

Growing your business in Asia!

07/11/2023

Increasing European investment in Asia...

(extracted from Financial Times, London, View from Asia column, Jan 2023)

www.linkedin.com/posts/lawrenceyeo_increasing-european-investment-in-asia-activity-7127493994351063040-NHb-?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

27/07/2022

Hi everyone. Our MD Lawrence Yeo just finished sharing his views on inflation in Asia and the impacts on business and FDI (foreign direct investment)(7:10min to 12:13min, new pending global minimum tax (14:15 min to 15:30 min), similar impact of Ghana on developing Asian economies (26:00 min to 26:20 min) and intra-Asia off-shoring/near-shoring (43:32 min to 45:45 min).

500 million+ members | Manage your professional identity. Build and engage with your professional network. Access knowledge, insights and opportunities.

23/02/2022

https://www.fdiintelligence.com/article/80641

Dwindling investment to and from the Asian dragon will be temporary

10/12/2021

https://www.fdiintelligence.com/article/80428

Real estate developers can tap into Asia’s rapid streaming growth

11/02/2021

Will Asians age well in Asia? How does Asia's fast ageing and COVID19 rollout affect Asia's economic development, employability, financial security, etc?Read on and share your thoughts and perspective.

(written by Lawrence Yeo for fDi Intelligence, Financial Times, London, Feb 2021) The UN states that inequalities often are exacerbated by age. Although by mid-century, 80% of east Asians aged 80 or older will be in China, the fastest ageing populations are in Japan, South Korea and Hong Kong, with

24/11/2017

Asia Financial Centres: North and South Divide

(Sep 2017, View From Asia, fDi magazine, Financial Times, London)

As of 27 March 2017, the Global Financial Centres Index (GFCI) ranked London, New York, Singapore,
Hong Kong and Tokyo as the top five financial centres. Asia financial centres from the top 20 include Singapore, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Sydney, Shanghai, Osaka and Beijing. Among the list of 88 financial centres, 21 are from Asia. Financial centres were ranked in five key areas: "business environment", "financial sector development", "infrastructure factors", "human capital", "reputation and general factors".

Leading Asia financial centres rose significantly while Western European ones remained volatile. Singapore gained at the expense of New York, closing the gap between third place Singapore and second place New York. Beijing rose significantly, rising ten places.

Among current factor conditions of major global disruptions, forces and trends like Brexit, new US presidential administration, increasing protectionism and digitization, how will these impact Asia’s financial centres?

In the short term, the situation is increasingly tense.

Political, security and major social upheavals undermine investor sentiment and unsettle financial centres despite improvements and gains from trade agreements, strong intra-Asia business environment and the other key ranked areas. Those in North Asia particularly are exposed to higher political and security risks.

If the North Korea security threat escalates to armed conflict on the Korean Peninsula, that alone will greatly undermine South Korea and Japan to a lesser extent.

India faces an unresolved border and territorial dispute with China as well as China’s strategic ties and support to Pakistan.

Should the US engage in an economic stand-off and sanctions with the world powers like China, then the Chinese financial centres will be much affected.

SE Asia centres face less of such risks. However, they face terrorism, insurgency and transnational crime as well as ongoing maritime disputes with China. China is trying to secure territorial and maritime claims in the Yellow, East and South China seas. In addition to China, the Spratlys are claimed by Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, and Taiwan. If confrontation were to involve Japan in the East China Sea or the Philippines in the South China Sea, the US would be obligated to consider military action under defense treaties.

Brighter prospects in Asia include rising economic growth, market liquidity and fintech development, improving ICT and transport infrastructure, as well as increasing workforce education and skills. These factors underpin the longer term financial sector development to ride out this current brewing storm and kerfuffle.

15/08/2017

Asia Infrastructure Investment: Increasing Private Sector Investment

(View from Asia, July 2017, Financial Times, London)

ADB reported that Asia infrastructure investment is sourced from mostly public sector (especially since post WW2), then official development assistance (ODA) and private participation in infrastructure (PPI). With public sector budgets being stretched, private institutional investors are increasingly providing more financing source from privatisations (19080’s) and PPP schemes (1990’s). These 2 capital sources help investment on Asia infrastructure and capital projects to reach 7% annually, projected to reach an annual volume of about US$5 trillion by 2025.

Public capital comes from central, regional, local, and other government institutions, plus national development banks (NDBs) and multilateral development banks (MDBs). Private capital is provided in two main forms: corporate finance (on balance sheet, from own resources of infrastructure companies) and project finance. In Asia, bank loans still dominate infrastructure project finance, and public sector banks play a major role, especially in China.

Across Asia, spending on infrastructure (as percentage of GDP) is different. First way is geographic. Highest spender is China, with South Korea as middle spender and then SE Asia being lowest spender. Under investment in infrastructure and poor maintenance of existing infrastructure are economic growth constraints and lead to infrastructure bottlenecks, in turn attracting less inward FDI which are job creators. A casual read reveals about Asia infrastructure projects which are either suspended, aborted over decades, or suffering from frequent breakdowns and accidents when funds are focused on the less strategic areas, depriving local communities badly needed social benefits and impacts.

Secondly, Asia infrastructure spending differs by income. Lower income countries experience significantly higher infrastructure needs (12.5% of GDP) than middle income (8.2%) and higher income (2.3%) countries. An estimated spending gap of US$1 trillion per annum is projected just for developing economies only.

ADB also found that 32 Asia developing economies would need infrastructure investment of US$8.2 trillion (in 2008 prices) between 2011 to 2020.About 50% of investments would go into energy, about one-third into transport (mostly roads), and the rest into telecommunications, water, and sanitation. Two-thirds is needed for new capacity and one-third for maintenance and the replacement of existing assets.

How will Asia infrastructure investment evolve? Private capital investment is traditionally very dependent on bank loans Expect more nonbank financial institutional players like pension funds, insurers, investment funds, and sovereign wealth funds. Also, there may be a greater use of securitization and capital markets in infrastructure finance together with further development of bond markets.