Must-watch: Singapore Reserves Revealed gives exclusive insight into the country’s rainy day fund

Singapore's central bank, the Monetary Authority of Singapore holds gold as part of the Official Foreign Reserves.

Singapore's national reserves have been described as its rainy day fund, an endowment for the future, and even the country’s “secret weapon”. The reserves are regarded as the reason why Singapore could emerge from the 2009 global financial crisis relatively unscathed and why it could buy vaccines so quickly during the COVID-19 pandemic.

But for many, the reserves are still shrouded in secrecy. For example, what are the reserves actually made up of? What steps are taken to ensure transparency and accountability in how the reserves are managed? What exactly has the President got to do with it all? And perhaps the million (or multi-billion) dollar question: Why can’t we know exactly how much is there?

To answer these questions and more, CNA has produced a brand-new web exclusive series Singapore Reserves Revealed premiering on CNA's YouTube channel on Wednesday (Aug 16). There will also be a two-part TV documentary special, Singapore Reserves on CNA at 9pm on Wednesday and Thursday (Aug 16 and 17). Both series feature exclusive interviews with the country’s top leaders, freshly released archives and never-before-granted access.

The series will look at:

Singapore’s hidden wealth: Where exactly are Singapore’s reserves invested? How much exactly is in the reserves, and how does buying a cup of coffee in Korea actually contribute to the overall pot?
  
The "inheritance" that almost didn’t exist: Letters found in the UK archives reveal the untold story of how the reserves came to be, and how Singapore fought fiercely for the right to control its reserves.

The inner workings of GIC and Temasek: Our cameras go behind the scenes at GIC and Temasek, and we meet the men and women responsible for growing Singapore’s reserves, and the difference their jobs make.

President, we have a problem: Through first-hand insider accounts, we tell the untold story behind the two rare occasions that the Singapore government made huge drawdowns of the reserves – the 2009 global financial crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Singapore’s secret weapon: How the reserves fuel many of the systems that make Singapore tick like clockwork, from keeping supermarket prices stable, to growing the CPF retirement funds of Singaporeans, to creating more space in land-scarce Singapore. 

We also feature an exclusive interview with Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on the reserves. Responsible for many of the policies that govern how the reserves are protected and used today, the Prime Minister gives us his take on Singapore’s reserves from his front-row seat.

WHAT WENT INTO PRODUCING THE SHOW

Produced over the span of six months, Singapore Reserves Revealed is to date, the most extensive look at one of Singapore’s most closely guarded secrets. Key to telling this story well was getting access to the very people involved in managing and growing Singapore’s reserves – from individuals to organisations, those who were there at the start, and those responsible for investing the reserves today.

The production team trawled through decades of investment reports, Budget statements and historical archives across Singapore and London, including former top secret internal British government memos. The story took us from a secret gold vault owned by the Monetary Authority of Singapore, to the Deputy Prime Minister’s junior college, to a solar farm on the outskirts of Manila. (For the record, we still don’t know where the vault is. We were blindfolded.)  

But it wasn’t just us doing the travelling - several Singaporeans based overseas also helped CNA locate and capture images of Singapore’s assets and investments in other countries - with some in places that we’d never expect. Our producers soon realised that there’s more to the reserves than initially thought.

BUSTING MYTHS ABOUT SINGAPORE'S RESERVES

The series seeks to demystify Singapore's reserves and debunk some common myths.

Myth 1: The reserves are made up of just cash stored in a bank or vault somewhere.

Fact: Singapore’s reserves consist not just of cash, but other financial assets like bonds and equities. The reserves are also made up of physical assets, like land, buildings, real estate and infrastructure both in Singapore and overseas.

Myth 2: The national reserves are an emergency piggy bank, something that’s only useful during a national crisis.

Fact: Besides being a rainy day fund, the reserves are used in a variety of ways. These include funding public infrastructure, land reclamation projects and managing the cost of imported goods by using the reserves to intervene in foreign exchange markets.

Myth 3: The government interferes with Temasek’s investment decisions.

Fact: The government does not dictate Temasek’s investment strategies. Temasek has its own investment board that oversees investment decisions.

This article was originally published on ChannelNewsAsia. Its inclusion on this website is solely for education purposes.