Chips Surge as Refineries Run Half-Empty
Wong warns of Hormuz pain and AI risk, semiconductors mask a 50% petrochem slowdown, Wellington signs a binding supply pact.
Singapore business, finance and trade news, every Monday.
Wong's Two-Front War
Lawrence Wong used the May Day Rally to deliver a two-pronged warning for Singapore on the Hormuz block and on AI. He said that the oil disruption could end up being worse than the 1970s oil shocks, and that AI is set to hollow out the first rung of the career ladder for the youngest workers. GDP shrank 0.3 percent QoQ in Q1 against revised Q4 2025 figures, MAS has tightened, and inflation forecasts for 2026 have been revised upwards into a range of 1.5 to 2.5 percent. Wong's line that "we may not be able to protect every job, but we will protect every worker" got applause, but the policy architecture around it is news. The Ministry of Manpower, NTUC and the Singapore National Employers Federation have come together to create a Tripartite Jobs Council that’s going to manage oversight of enterprise AI adoption, training and support for at-risk workers.
Read more: Business Times ($1B package), Business Times (National AI Council), Yahoo Finance (Wong), Business Times ($500M eldercare), Business Times (TJC three pillars)
Chips Cover for Crippled Refineries
The split inside Q1's headline number is where the action is as electronics output is up 30% year-on-year in March on semiconductor demand, as the chemicals cluster (about 1.7% of GDP) is running at half speed. Q1 GDP was reported at 4.6% YoY, down from a 5.7% pace in H2 2025. More than 70% of crude imports are from the Middle East, and with refineries operating at 50-60% capacity, the petrochemical sector is essentially parked. Gartner expects global semiconductor revenue to be $1.32 trillion in 2026, up from earlier estimates of “only” a trillion, and DBS has maintained buy ratings on UMS Integration, AEM Holdings, and Frencken Group. But chipmakers have their own Middle East exposure in helium, which is a necessary input in semiconductor manufacturing and also largely supplied from the Middle East. With full-year GDP expected at 3%, growth concerns could keep MAS on hold in July despite its earlier tightening and a core inflation forecast that’s gone up between 1.5 and 2.5% from 1-2%.
Read more: Sbr (refinery capacity), Sbr (semi revenue)
Wellington Locks In the Pantry
Singapore and New Zealand signed what's being called the world's first legally binding bilateral supply chain resilience agreement on Monday. The deal covers food, fuel, healthcare, chemicals and construction materials. It’s come at a fortuitous time - when hands were first pumped on the deal in October, nobody expected the Strait of Hormuz to be a live problem four months later. NZ PM Christopher Luxon told RNZ the treaty was already in effect before the ink dried, and he brought Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Trade Minister Todd McClay along to visit Singapore's refineries in person. Two-way trade is about US$6.5 billion, and Singapore is the second-largest source of investment into New Zealand.
Read more: Business Times (six CSP pillars), AsiaOne (Willis fuel meetings), Rnz Co NZ (NZ trade)
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Mainland Money Finds a New Home
Mainland Chinese firms have gone from a rounding error to the second-largest source of fixed-asset investment as they raised their share from 2.5% to 21% of the S$14.16 billion ($11.07 billion) total in 2025. American investors slid from first to third as their share collapsed from 55.5% to 17.3%. Europe now sits in the top spot at around 25%.
Read more: South China Morning Post
The Pump, the Pantry, the Pinch
RON95 fuel is up nearly 20 percent and diesel has gone up more than 50 percent since the Hormuz blockade started to bite in late February, pushing a typical 50-liter fill-up from S$142.50 ($106) to S$171 ($128). The squeeze, unfortunately, doesn't stop at the pump. A SingStat analysis of supermarket pricing data, released April 29, found shrinkflation is on the rise for commonly bought home items, with instant coffee/ tea, laundry detergent, ice cream, milk powder and diapers leading the way. So, for consumers this means the same price for a smaller box.
Read more: AsiaOne (airline fares, utilities), Business Times (unit pricing pilot)
SGX Wants to See the Pay Stub
SGX RegCo's public consultation window, opened April 22, is seeking input on changes that would force listed companies to spell out the metrics behind executive pay, their dividend policies, and how they talk to investors. About two-thirds of the largest issuers currently don't disclose having an investor relations policy, and (an overlapping, but different) two-thirds of listed firms don’t currently share the metrics that tether (or not?) executive pay to long-term value. Right now, companies need only report directors' and CEO remuneration totals, with "comply-or-explain" nudges doing the rest. Under the proposal, companies would have to publish the specific KPIs that drive pay decisions and explain how those targets align with the creation of shareholder value. SGX RegCo chief executive Tan Boon Gin said (we imagine dryly), there is "room for disclosure requirements to level up."
Read more: CNA
More Gas Now, Hydrogen Maybe Later
The Energy Market Authority has put out its third call for gas turbines in three years, this time wanting up to 1,800 MW of new combined-cycle capacity between now and 2032. The regulator is forecasting peak demand of 9.6 to 11.4 GW (seems like a wide spread, but forecasting is difficult?) by 2031, growing 2.4 to 4.8 percent yearly on the back of semiconductors and data center needs. Interestingly, the turbines are required to be hydrogen-ready, but the actual fuel, for now, remains gas. Proposals for a 2031 unit are due Jun 24, 2026, bids for 2032 units are required by Sep 30.
Read more: Business Times
Four Months Down to One
From January 2027, construction firms won't need to force new workers from China and Thailand to take overseas competency tests before getting entry to Singapore in a move that is expected to shorten the hiring process from four months to one. National Development Minister Chee Hong Tat shared the change at the BuildSG Lead Summit in response to industry complaints that overseas certification was slow and, in any event, often mismatched workers' actual deployment needs. Workers will instead be tested on trade knowledge and practical skills once they arrive in Singapore (companies will need to reserve a test slot before arrival). South Asian source countries, including India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Myanmar, will follow in January 2028.
Read more: Business Times
Silicon Box Squares Up
Singapore startup Silicon Box expects to ship more than a billion chiplet-based devices this year by ditching round wafers for square panels, which waste less surface area. Founded in May 2021, they shipped 250 million devices by the end of Q1 and expect 1.5 billion cumulative units to be sold by October. Q1 revenue has been reported to be about three-quarters of the full-year 2025 tally, and booked order volume is running at 10 to 12 times 2025 levels.
Read more: Business Times
Hotels Cash In As Missiles Fly
Tourist arrivals rose 2.8% to 4.4 million in Q1 2026, and hotel RevPAR climbed 4.8% to S$228.45 ($175) in the quarter. February (CNY) did most of the work with mainland China arrivals up 61.3%, and room revenue inflated 13.3% that month alone. STB's Poh Chi Chuan says recent business events are a picture of "strong participation and healthy attendance," waving off MICE jitters. Average occupancy was just over 83%, up from 80.54% a year earlier. Total room revenue for the quarter was reported S$1.36 billion ($1.04 billion).
Read more: Business Times (ARR & STB CEO), Business Times (MICE resilience)
AI Pads Paychecks, Picks the Locks
Software engineers with AI skills are now earning 13 to 25 percent more than peers without them, as per SCMP’s reporting. Less helpfully, the same technology was reported to have been involved in 84 percent of reported Singapore security breaches here over the past 12 months. Sixty percent of Singapore-based organizations were breached at least once in the past year, and 92 percent of Singaporean leaders (the highest share of any region surveyed) fear "harvest now, decrypt later" attacks on data that, while encrypted today, may be easy to decipher tomorrow.
Read more: South China Morning Post (AI salary premium), Frontier Enterprise (breach visibility gap)
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