© Edgar Su / Reuters/REUTERS
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You would be forgiven for being unfamiliar with BHG Retail Real Estate Investment Trust, but the Chinese department store investment vehicle holds a particular significance in Singapore. Last December, it became the first – and only – company to list on the Singapore Exchange’s main board in the whole of 2015.
It is true that the Catalist second board mustered a dozen modest raisings and that any exchange can have a bad year in uncertain markets. But while SGX raised just S$593 million ($427.7 million) in 2015, Hong Kong raised HK$260.3 billion ($33.6 billion) in 123 IPOs, according to Deloitte.
It is also true that 2016 has been, in some ways, brighter. By the end of August SGX had attracted 17 IPOs, worth S$6.4 billion. But over the same period it saw 18 delistings, after 19 the previous year.
