Speaking at a sovereign wealth fund conference at SMU, Temasek Holdings Chairman Lim Boon Heng said that although the fund is usually lumped together with other sovereign wealth funds, it has a unique body that shares few characteristics with these organisations. He ran through the many areas of difference, which range from the investment company’s strategies to its relationship with the Government.
At the fourth Sovereign Wealth Fund Conference held at SMU, Nobel laureate Thomas Sargent speculated that the powerful US Federal Reserve gives forward guidance about its intentions not so much to help the market, which is already using the same predictive model as the Fed. Rather, Fed management does so to tie the hands of successors to a consistent policy to maintain the institution’s reputation.
Lim Boon Heng: Government has never been involved in the daily operations of Temasek Holdings; it is an independently-run company
At the fourth Sovereign Wealth Fund Conference held at SMU, Temasek Holdings Chairman Lim Boon Heng said that although the Singapore government is the company’s sole shareholder, it has never been involved in the daily operations and investment decisions of Temasek. Temasek has always been run as an independent investment company. Mr Lim also stressed that Temasek defends its decision-making freedom from political interference, but does not view it as a matter of course. He said that, as a long-term investor, Temasek looks at returns ranging from five to 20 years to measure its own performance, rather than considering the rate of returns each quarter. It will also not be concerned by the fluctuating rate of returns annually. Mr Lim pointed out that by adopting mark-to-market investment disciplines, Temasek is able to avoid the anxieties typical investors face when considering the losses that will be incurred from divestment. This helps it maintain agility when it responds in the face of intense market volatility.
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Speaking at the fourth Sovereign Wealth Fund Conference [held at SMU] on Thursday, Temasek Holdings Chairman Mr Lim Boon Heng said that Temasek Holdings had made substantial contributions to benefit Singapore and Singaporeans, and that these contributions have helped to boost the Government's budget revenue to fund social programmes and kept tax burdens light
SMU Visiting Professor of Economics and Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Silver Security with SMU’s Sim Kee Boon Institute for Financial Economics, Rhema Vaithianathan, studies how the unprecedented ‘silver tsunami’ is changing not only the way we fund care for the elderly, but also how that care is being delivered. A key issue she studies is healthcare financing. Fascinated by the treasure trove of data about citizens collected by government agencies and healthcare providers for administrative purposes, Prof Vaithianathan uses this data to perform predictive risk modelling. The overall aim is to develop automated algorithms to identify high-risk individuals who may require emergency intervention for the benefit of not only themselves, but also the community.
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