SINGAPORE, Jan 28 (Reuters) – He became the public face of Singapore’s most iconic company, Singapore Airlines , at the start of the year but it’s unlikely the CEO title will change Goh Choon Phong, who is low-profile to the point of near-anonymity.

Goh’s predecessor Chew Choon Seng, now the chairman of Singapore Exchange, became one of the most influential people in the airline industry during his seven years in office, and is well-known for his passion for cars and watches.

Little however is known about Goh, except that at 47 he is one of the youngest CEO’s of a major Singapore company. He is single, and joined Singapore Airlines as a cadet two decades ago after graduating from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with three bachelors degrees and a masters degree.

At a news conference late last year after his appointment was announced, Goh, slim and clean-shaven, was reticent and politely declined any substantive comment.

His quick rise to the top and hands-on experience in almost every major division in the group underlines his capabilities, colleagues say, but that’s all most people know about him.

“I have not met him in person and neither have heard anyone talk about him at all,” said one Singapore-based airline staffer.

Another described Goh as “a very hard-working person, down to earth and a low-profile person. An all rounder with all the qualities the airline really needs.”

SINGAPORE, Jan 25 (Reuters) – The Philippines is better prepared to deal with inflation than some of the Southeast Asian nation’s neighbors that are also suffering from sudden capital outflows, Fitch Ratings said in an interview on Tuesday.

Fears that some policymakers in Asia are falling behind in a fight against higher prices have accelerated a shift in allocations of foreign investors’ portfolios, so far benefiting Malaysia, South Korea and Taiwan and hurting India, Indonesia and Thailand.

The Philippines has been also swept up with the country’s bonds and shares being sold off. A bill auction on Monday failed because Manila thought the rates demanded by investors were too high, despite surging secondary market yields.

Andrew Colquhoun, head of Asia Pacific sovereigns at Fitch, is positive on the country, citing some favourable trends at play that will help it weather price pressures.

“Inflation dynamics remain pretty favourable and I think the BSP (the Philippine central bank) is one of those with a better track record of delivering appropriate policy,” he told the Dealing Room, a Reuters chat room, when asked about inflationary concerns in Asia.

Colquhoun said in an interview that improved tax collection, relatively strong economic growth and robust remittances from overseas Filipinos were all helping the country’s profile.

Fitch has a BB rating on the Philippines long-term foreign currency debt with a stable outlook.

SINGAPORE, Jan 25 (Reuters) – Artradis Fund Management, once Singapore’s biggest hedge fund manager with about $4.5 billion, plans to wind down its operations and return money to investors after it lost money in the last two years, co-founder Stephen Diggle said on Tuesday.

“In the last two years, we have been losing money and that is why we are closing,” he told Reuters.

Diggle said Artradis currently manages around S$500 million, down from its peak of about $4.5 billion at the end of 2008, as it had been returning money to investors.

“The fact that we had a specific long volatility mandate was why the firm grew so large. But in the last two years, it has been an Achilles’ heel,” he added.

Artradis, which bets on swings in asset prices, made a fortune during the financial crisis when stock and bond prices plunged.

Its two main funds — Artradis AB2 Fund and Artradis Barracuda — had “long volatility” mandates, which meant they offered investors a good hedge against falling asset prices.

According to data compiled by Thomson Reuters Lipper, Artradis’ two main volatility funds posted double-digit losses in 2010 and 2009 as financial markets rallied.

SINGAPORE, Jan 25 (Reuters) – The Philippines is better prepared to deal with inflation than some of the Southeast Asian nation’s neighbors that are also suffering from sudden capital outflows, Fitch Ratings said in an interview on Tuesday.

Fears that some policymakers in Asia are falling behind in a fight against higher prices have accelerated a shift in allocations of foreign investors’ portfolios, so far benefiting Malaysia, South Korea and Taiwan and hurting India, Indonesia and Thailand.

The Philippines has been also swept up with the countries being sold off. A bill auction on Monday failed because Manila thought the rates demanded by investors were too high, despite surging secondary market yields.

Andrew Colquhoun, head of Asia Pacific sovereigns at Fitch, is positive on the country, citing some favourable trends at play that will help it weather price pressures.

“Inflation dynamics remain pretty favourable and I think the BSP (the Philippine central bank) is one of those with a better track record of delivering appropriate policy,” he told the Dealing Room, a Reuters chat room, when asked about inflationary concerns in Asia.

Colquhoun said in an interview that improved tax collection, relatively strong economic growth and robust remittances from overseas Filipinos were all helping the country’s profile.

Fitch has a BB rating on the Philippines long-term foreign currency debt with a stable outlook.

SINGAPORE, Jan 21 (Reuters) – Standard Chartered (STAN.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), the British emerging markets-focused bank, plans to continue hiring aggressively in Asia despite rising costs and thinning margins, it said on Friday, as it believes growth in the region will outpace that of the rest of the world.

“We are in an economic super-cycle,” Chief Executive Peter Sands said at the opening of the bank’s new Singapore office, which includes a three-level trading room for 790 people that it described as Asia’s largest.

Stanchart also reiterated its commitment to hire another 2,000 people in Singapore by the end of 2012, adding to its staff of over 6,000 in the city-state.

“Our sense of optimism about the opportunities across Asia and our commitment to investing and building our businesses across Asia hasn’t changed at all,” Sands told reporters.

Despite galloping economic growth in Asia, the region’s banks are struggling to raise earnings as stronger loans and increased corporate activity are offset by tough trading conditions, falling interest margins and rising staff costs.

DBS (DBSM.SI: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), Southeast Asia’s largest lender, for example saw net interest income decline 5 percent during the third quarter ended September despite a 15 percent rise in loans from a year ago.

The Singapore bank, however, managed to post a 28 percent rise in net profit due to higher fee income and lower bad debt provisions. [ID:nSGE6A206H]

SINGAPORE, Jan 13 (Reuters) – Singapore on Thursday introduced new measures to cool home prices that have continued to rise despite earlier efforts to put a lid on a red-hot property market.

Effective Friday, those who buy and sell residential properties within four years will have to pay a stamp duty, up from the current requirement of three years.

Individual buyers who are still servicing an existing loan can only borrow up to 60 percent of the new property’s value, down from 70 percent at the moment. For corporate investors, the loan-to-value limit will be cut to 50 percent.

“Previous government measures have to some extent moderated the market, but sentiment remain buoyant,” the finance and national development ministries said in a joint statement with the central bank.

“Low interest rates plus excessive liquidity in the financial system, both in Singapore and globally, could cause prices to rise beyond sustainable levels based on economic fundamentals,” the government agencies added.

Singapore home prices rose to record levels in the fourth quarter, but at a slower pace, prompting some observers to suggest the government may hold off implementing new measures. [ID:nL3E7C30DX]

The city-state last announced measures to cool its property market on Aug 30 last year.

SINGAPORE, Jan 5 (Reuters)Perennial Real Estate, a firm set up by former CapitaLand retail chief Pua Seck Guan, has hired Goldman Sachs , DBS and Standard Chartered to help it raise as much as S$1 billion ($777 million) in a property trust IPO, sources with knowledge of the deal said on Wednesday.

Perennial intends to list a business trust in Singapore that will comprise mostly shopping malls in China, said the sources, who declined to be named because the matter has not been made public.

Pre-marketing of the deal is scheduled to begin later this month with the formal launch of the initial public offering slated for the end of March, the sources added.

A spokeswoman for Perennial, which is involved in the development and management of malls as well as property funds, said the firm had businesses in China, India and Singapore and it “continues to explore opportunties in these markets”.

The three banks either declined comment or could not be reached.

Under Singapore law, a real estate investment trust (REIT) faces restrictions on its level of borrowings and is obliged to distribute at least 90 percent of its income.

By putting its assets in a business trust, Perennial has greater scope to invest in properties under development and retains the flexibility of paying out a smaller portion of rental income to shareholders, two of the sources said.

SINGAPORE, Jan 4 (Reuters) – Singapore-based Indian equity fund Helios Strategic is betting on lenders such as HDFC Bank , despite a strong run-up last year, though it continues to hold short positions on Indian telcos as it believes the industry’s woes are far from over.

Helios, headed by high-profile Indian fund manager Samir Arora, is making a comeback after a disastrous 2008 when it lost about 66 percent and saw investors pull out of the fund, which once had about $1 billion in assets.

The fund returned 16 percent in the 11 months to end-November 2010 after gaining 67 percent net of fees in 2009, according to Lipper Tass, beating the Eurekahedge Asia hedge fund index and CSFB/Tremont emerging markets subindex over the same period.

For 2011, Helios sees continued growth in the financial sector as India’s middle class expands and private sector players gain market share as one of its main investment themes.

“The big picture is the under-penetration of financial services,” Arora, who now lives in Singapore, told Reuters in an interview on Monday.

“Even today the private sector financial institutions have about 30-percent-odd market share in India, and every year they collectively increase their market share at the expense of the state-owned banks,” he added.

“People dislike HDFC on valuations but there are no other reasons,” he said, when asked if it was time to take profit after the stock climbed 38 percent last year.

HONG KONG/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Two smaller Asian hedge funds that have bet on Thai and Southeast Asian stocks have made a killing this year, racking up more than 80 percent gains and ranking among the world’s 100 top-performing hedge funds.

The Thai Focused Equity (Class A) and Albizia ASEAN Opportunities funds, however, have received only a trickle of fresh inflows compared to the cash that global investors have been pouring into their larger rivals in Asia.

The fight for assets is likely to extend to 2011 as investors continue to shun smaller funds. Rising compliance costs will also crimp their ability to turn a profit and make it tougher for start-ups in Singapore and Hong Kong to grow.

The reluctance of institutional investors to park assets in smaller players could stymie the development of the $125 billion Asian hedge fund industry since small hedge funds have often been the source of innovative ideas in the West.

“It’s been very difficult to raise money,” said Jeep Chatikavanij, chief investment officer of Hunters Investments, whose $70 million Ton Poh Thailand Fund was up nearly 70 percent up to November in 2010, putting it in the third spot among the 11 Asia-themed funds on Lipper world’s top-100 hedge funds.

“Largely big hedge funds have been attracting money.”

Reasons cited by institutional investors for not allocating money to smaller funds include uncertainty as to whether managers can replicate the strong gains they showed in the past as well as concerns about the quality of risk management.

HONG KONG/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Two smaller Asian hedge funds that have bet on Thai and Southeast Asian stocks have made a killing this year, racking up more than 80 percent gains and ranking among the world’s 100 top-performing hedge funds.

The Thai Focused Equity (Class A) and Albizia ASEAN Opportunities funds, however, have received only a trickle of fresh inflows compared to the cash that global investors have been pouring into their larger rivals in Asia.

The fight for assets is likely to extend to 2011 as investors continue to shun smaller funds. Rising compliance costs will also crimp their ability to turn a profit and make it tougher for start-ups in Singapore and Hong Kong to grow.

The reluctance of institutional investors to park assets in smaller players could stymie the development of the $125 billion Asian hedge fund industry since small hedge funds have often been the source of innovative ideas in the West.

“It’s been very difficult to raise money,” said Jeep Chatikavanij, chief investment officer of Hunters Investments, whose $70 million Ton Poh Thailand Fund was up nearly 70 percent up to November in 2010, putting it in the third spot among the 11 Asia-themed funds on Lipper world’s top-100 hedge funds.

“Largely big hedge funds have been attracting money.”

Reasons cited by institutional investors for not allocating money to smaller funds include uncertainty as to whether managers can replicate the strong gains they showed in the past as well as concerns about the quality of risk management.