COE price for small cars plunges by 30%

COE price for small cars plunges by 30%

By Maria Almenoar

CERTIFICATE of entitlement (COE) prices for small cars plummeted 30 per cent yesterday to $9,501, hitting their lowest levels in over a year.
The fall follows months of softening demand which dealers say has been driven by soaring inflation.

They blamed rising prices for everything from rice to fuel, along with a growing number of Electronic Road Pricing gantries, for keeping budget-conscious small car buyers out of showrooms.

‘This group of buyers are the hardest hit by the softening economy so they may reconsider big purchases like a car,’ said Mr Vincent Ng, the product manager for Kah Motor in Ubi.

In the latest bidding results released yesterday, the COE for cars under 1,600cc dropped from $13,289 to $9,501. It was the lowest mark since August last year, when it dove to $8,118.

Some analysts blamed high petrol prices, currently at $1.963 a litre for 92-octane fuel. That is a roughly 30 per cent rise over this time last year. Motorists have also faced about a 10 per cent rise in parking charges over the last year.

The president of the Motor Traders Association of Singapore, said new ERP gantries and a recent increase in charges may have also discouraged potential small car buyers. ‘Perhaps some marginal buyers have decided not to buy a car,’ said Ms Tan Kheng Hwee.

In July, several gantries were opened near the Singapore River and the Government announced plans to build another six across the island by November.

The move was part of a wide-ranging plan to relieve congestion and encourage more Singaporeans to use public transport.

The rising costs seem to be encouraging people to hang onto their cars for longer. In the first six months of this year, about 22,400 small cars were taken off the roads, compared with over 25,800 during the same period last year.

Inflation and ERP gantries, though, seem to be having less of an effect on larger car buyers. In the latest bidding yesterday, COE prices of cars 1,600cc and above fell, but by just over 3.5 per cent to $13,389. Prices for all other categories, however, increased.

The COE for commercial vehicles ended 7 per cent higher at $13,889 while the motorcycle premium ended 11 per cent higher at $1,452. The Open COE category - used mainly for cars - ended 2 per cent higher at $14,300.

Next month, the Government is expected to reduce the COE supply to compensate for the fact that fewer cars are being taken off the roads. Industry watchers say that will likely result in higher prices.

Source : Straits Times - 04 Sept 2008

Singapore Property - Buy, Sell, Rent, Invest

Mindy Yong

(+65)91002985

mindy@mindyyong.com

Tang jailed for a day, fined $17,000

Tang jailed for a day, fined $17,000
By Khushwant Singh and Sujin Thomas

Ailing retail magnate Tang Wee Sung (left) walking out of Queenstown Remand Prison with his lawyer Cavinder Bull. Tang’s sentence for his attempt to illegally purchase a kidney included a day’s jail, but he was released after a few hours. ST PHOTO: AZIZ HUSSIN

AT 5.45PM yesterday, ailing retail magnate Tang Wee Sung, 56, walked out of Queenstown Remand Prison.
He had been sentenced in the afternoon to a day’s jail, but was set free at the end of the business day, after two hours.

About the case

Tang Wee Sung arriving in court with his nurse. He was jailed for one day and fined $17,000 for lying under oath and entering into an illegal kidney deal. ST PHOTO: WONG KWAI CHOW

Wang Chin Sing (left) was offered $300,000 to arrange the illegal sale of Mr Sulaiman’s kidney to Tang. He will be sentenced tomorrow.

Sketch of Indonesians Toni (left) and Sulaiman who were jailed for agreeing to sell their kidneys for over $20,000 each.
TANG Wee Sung is the third person to be jailed in the first illegal organ transplant case here.

In June, an Indonesian by the name of Toni, 27, was jailed 31/2 months and fined $2,000, while his compatriot Sulaiman Damanik, 26, served a three-week prison term.

Both men had lied in statutory declarations and before a transplant ethics committee that they were distant relatives of the organ recipients.

Toni sold his kidney for 186 million rupiah (S$29,000) to an Indonesian woman; Mr Sulaiman was arrested here before he could sell his kidney to Tang for $23,700.

Wang Chin Seng, 44, who helped arrange the illegal deals, will be sentenced tomorrow.

He admitted to 10 charges which included organ trading and coaching Tang and the Indonesians to lie in their statutory declarations; he also coached them to lie to the ethics committee that they were related to their respective recipients and that no payment was involved.

Wang was offered $300,000 to arrange the deal between Tang and Mr Sulaiman.

Another man, Whang Sung Lin, Tang’s 44-year-old nephew-in-law, has been charged with abetment by introducing Wang to Tang in return for a fee.

His trial is being arranged.

‘I’m fine,’ were the only words he uttered. He waved at family members as he got into a waiting car.

It brought to an end his run-in with the law in the first case here involving the illegal sale of a human organ - a kidney in this instance.

Earlier in the day, he paid $17,000 in fines for lying under oath and for organ trading.

In handing down the sentence, District Judge Ng Peng Hong said he was mindful that Tang’s potential kidney donor Sulaiman Damanik had been jailed two weeks for the same offence of making a false statutory declaration, but that, ‘given the very exceptional circumstances of Tang’s extreme ill health’, a long jail term was unnecessary.

Judge Ng acknowledged that Tang had broken the law, but added that more guilt should be placed with the dealers or middleman who sought to profit from the desperation of the poor organ seller and that of the terminally-ill buyer.

Tang, who pleaded guilty last week, stood expressionless in the dock for about half an hour before he was allowed to sit down.

When the hearing started at 2.30pm, the public gallery was packed with about 50 family members, friends and colleagues. Police turned away latecomers.

Tang’s lawyer, Senior Counsel Cavinder Bull, had asked the court to be lenient to his client last week, citing Tang’s long list of ailments and his daily regimen of 50 pills and injections.

Mr Bull suggested that the court impose a fine for his client’s offence of organ trading, which, under the Human Organ Transplant Act, stipulates a fine of up to $10,000 or a jail term of up to a year or both.

He also asked the court to consider a conditional discharge for Tang’s making of a false statutory declaration. This offence comes with a mandatory jail term of up to three years. Offenders may also be fined up to $10,000.

Mr Bull’s arguments last week centred on how inexpedient it would be to jail Tang, and that, at most, the penalty should not be more than a day’s jail.

The prosecution had argued that Tang was as guilty as Sulaiman in the eyes of the law and was the driving force in the illicit transaction.

The case has sparked a national debate on whether laws here need to be changed to allow some form of organ trading.

On the defence’s arguments that organ trading could soon be decriminalised by Parliament, Judge Ng said the matter was too speculative for him to consider.

He noted, however, that Tang had acted out of desperation, believing he was likely to die without a kidney transplant.

Mr Bull told reporters outside the courtroom that he was satisfied with the sentence and ruled out an appeal.

He said: ‘He is obviously going to be relieved that it is not longer than what he got, but I would not underestimate the impact of the sentence on him.’

Family members were, however, upset that Tang was jailed even a day. His older sister Janet Liok told The Straits Times: ‘We are very sad. He’s very sick and we are very worried now.’

Several members of the Singapore Retailers Association were also present.

Mr Keith Chua, 55, who has been close to Tang since their days at Anglo-Chinese School, felt that the judge had been merciful.

The businessman, who showed up in court with five other former schoolmates, said: ‘The judge explained the basis for his decision quite clearly. He is still going to have to deal with his medical condition once this is over.’

Later yesterday evening, Mr Bull told The Straits Times that Tang had gone home after being released from prison.

‘He was tired from the day’s activities. We discussed some legal matters and then I left him with his nurse,’ said Mr Bull.

Tang, who stepped down as the executive chairman of the C.K. Tang retail empire after his conviction last week, has one to two years to live without a kidney transplant.

Source : Straits Times - 04 Sept 2008

Singapore Property - Buy, Sell, Rent, Invest

Mindy Yong

(+65)91002985

mindy@mindyyong.com

Singapore Charities Act to be tightened with proposed amendments

Singapore Charities Act to be tightened with proposed amendments

More power for Commissioner to query fund-raisers and IPCs

By JAMIE LEE

THE government is tightening up on fund-raisers and institutions of a public character (IPCs) with more proposed amendments to the Charities Act.

The amendments, which follow an earlier round last year, would empower the Commissioner of Charities to gather information on fund-raisers other than charities and call for inquiries and suspension of board members of IPCs, the Office of the Commissioner of Charities said yesterday.

It would also look to boost accounting standards for charities and fund-raising regulations, and clarify the roles of board members of charitable organisations and IPCs.

Charities and IPCs that do not comply with accounting standards determined by the Accounting Standards Council (ASC) for charities may be fined up to $10,000, though individual charities and IPCs can be exempted from compliance of certain clauses by the Commissioner of Charities.

The Office of the Commissioner of Charities has also proposed to allow the ASC to determine the income and expenditure thresholds for charities and IPCs that would warrant an external audit. Currently, all IPCs and charities with income or expenditure exceeding $250,000 are subjected to external audits.

In addition, the ministry said it would repeal Part VII of the Charities Act and transfer relevant provisions to the fund-raising regulations. These include a prohibition on professional fund-raiser raising money for a charitable institution without an agreement in the prescribed form. Such professionals must also indicate the institutions benefiting and the remuneration arrangements.

Part VII had not been brought into operation, despite it being part of the Act since 1994, as ‘there was then no need to regulate fund-raising’, the Office of the Commissioner of Charities said in a media release. It added that in recent years, there have been more questions raised on accountability in commercial fund-raising.

Fund-raisers that are not charities could also be forced to provide information needed for any inquiries by the Commissioner of Charities, as ‘occasionally, the need to conduct further investigation on fund-raisers following public complaints may be thwarted by the unwillingness of the fund-raiser to furnish the Commissioner with information’, it said.

The Office of Commissioner of Charities is also proposing to extend its jurisdiction to include ‘instigating inquiry and invoking protective actions such as the suspension or removal of board members, as in the case of charities’.

It has suggested adding a provision to protect governing board members and employees at charities from personal liability to assuage the ‘perceived risks’ in the light of recent controversies in the charity circuit that has deterred volunteers, as well as replacing the term ‘charity trustees’ to distinguish between them and those who have obligations towards the Trustees Act.

Source : Business Times - 04 Sept 2008

Singapore Property - Buy, Sell, Rent, Invest

Mindy Yong

(+65)91002985

mindy@mindyyong.com

Singapore Temasek, GIC dominate world’s largest SWF deals

Singapore Temasek, GIC dominate world’s largest SWF deals

The S’pore units invest a combined US$9.1b, 47% more than a year ago

By CONRAD TAN

(SINGAPORE) Temasek Holdings and the Government of Singapore Investment Corp (GIC) have been involved in five of the 10 biggest deals involving sovereign wealth funds on record, according to the latest estimates by Thomson Reuters.

Singapore’s two state-owned funds have poured billions into US and European banks since last year. The sheer size of their recent investments has surpassed many of the biggest purchases made by sovereign wealth funds in the past.

GIC’s injection of 11 billion Swiss francs (S$14.24 billion) into Switzerland’s biggest bank, UBS, last December is the single largest investment by a sovereign fund on record, according to data compiled by Thomson Reuters.

GIC was also part of the consortium led by Spain’s Ferrovial Group that bought UK-listed BAA, the world’s biggest airport operator, for £10.3 billion (S$26.7 billion) in May 2006. That deal, which also included Canadian pension fund Caisse, still stands as the largest investment involving sovereign funds on record.

So far this year, both GIC and Temasek have made a combined US$9.1 billion worth of investments, more than a third of all deals involving sovereign funds worldwide and a 47 per cent increase from a year earlier, according to Thomson Reuters estimates.

GIC invests Singapore’s foreign reserves including pension savings, estimated at over US$300 billion, while Temasek manages a separate S$185 billion investment portfolio.

The bulk of these investments were in the US, the largest of which was GIC’s US$6.88 billion investment in banking giant Citigroup in January.

That was the single biggest investment by any sovereign fund this year and the fourth largest on record.

GIC was also one of four investors in the fifth-largest sovereign fund deal on record - a £2.5 billion takeover of Associated British Ports, the UK’s largest port operator, in March 2006.

GIC invests Singapore’s foreign reserves including pension savings, estimated at over US$300 billion, while Temasek manages a separate S$185 billion investment portfolio.

Temasek’s US$4.4 billion investment in US investment bank Merrill Lynch last December is the 10th largest sovereign fund deal on record. In January, two other sovereign funds, the Korea Investment Corp and the Kuwait Investment Authority, each poured another US$2 billion into Merrill.

Separately, Temasek invested £975 million in UK banking group Barclays in July last year. It is now likely to raise its stake in Merrill to as much as 14 per cent from about 9 per cent, after US regulators gave their approval this week (Aug 26).

Together, GIC and Temasek accounted for 10 of the 22 major deals involving sovereign funds this year, until Aug 28.

Investments by sovereign funds worldwide rose 65 per cent to US$25.5 billion, from US$15.4 billion for the same period last year, according to Thomson Reuters.

Source : Straits Times - 04 Sept 2008

Singapore Property - Buy, Sell, Rent, Invest

Mindy Yong

(+65)91002985

mindy@mindyyong.com