An IPO elsewhere is not always a big loss for SGX

Singapore

FOURTEEN months ago an investment and financial education firm marked its debut on the Australian Stock Exchange, raising nearly A$18 million (S$17.71 million).

Should the Singapore Exchange care much? "It should - a lot", some may be too quick to think.

After all, the firm, 8I Holdings, is a true-blue Singapore-grown entity, hence it should have been a shoo-in for SGX - not the ASX - to wrest its stock offering mandate.

Rubbing salt to the wound for SGX, which is ailed by a dearth of IPOs since last year, is 8I Holdings' superb showing - the stock has leaped over five-fold since its December 2014 listing and now has a market value of over A$400 million.

In an interview with The Edge last month, the company's chairman, Ken Chee, who owns 24 per cent of the firm, admitted that the advisers had told the firm not to try for SGX as "at best" it would have sn…