Singapore mortgages may resist global rates downtrend - for now

Singapore

INTEREST rates are falling across the world - with some markets already mired in negative rates - but the flow through to Singapore mortgage rates may be mitigated by local factors.

"Most mortgage rates in Singapore are pegged to Sibor (Singapore Interbank Offered Rate) in one way or another; though sometimes they are called differently, like board rates, they all have to correspond to market interest rate (ie, Sibor) in order for banks to maintain their profit margins,'' said Duckju Kang, chief executive officer of ValueChampion, a consumer finance research firm.