Bank busts, crime busts and war. The year 2023 may go down in history as a record-breaking one for global financial markets, and a nail-biting one for local political pundits.

Here are some of the big events that needled traders and captivated news readers.

Banking crisis

Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) was closed by California banking regulators on Mar 10 and put into receivership, after the startup-focused lender failed to raise needed capital. At the time, SVB’s closure was the largest bank failure in US history since the 2008 financial crisis.

SVB’s failure seemed to have been precipitated by the winding down of cryptocurrency-focused Silvergate Bank. Two days after SVB’s collapse, crypto-linked Signature Bank fell too.

The implosion of these three small-to-mid-sized US banks ignited contagion fears across the globe in the months that followed, prompting the Federal Reserve to set up a nearly US$12 billion emergency lending programme.

The programme proved insufficient in preventing the closure of First Republic Bank in May.

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All these failures paled in comparison to the acquisition of Swiss financial behemoth Credit Suisse, however. Rival UBS paid three billion Swiss francs (S$4.6 billion) in June to save Credit Suisse, in a deal brokered by the Swiss government which saw the wiping out of US$17 billion of Credit Suisse’s Additional Tier-1 (AT1) bonds.

The takeover also resulted in Credit Suisse shedding some 13 per cent of its workforce over the first half of 2023.

Anti-money laundering bust

Ten foreigners were charged in court on Aug 16 over offences including money laundering, forgery and resisting arrest. The assets seized had swelled to S$2.8 billion by October.

It turned out that those arrested had been buying properties and incorporating companies in Singapore since 2017. One of the suspects had also been a non-executive director at listed seafood restaurant operator No Signboard Holdings.

The high-profile case prompted government agencies to review various anti-money laundering measures, including the incentive process for single family offices and penalties on errant corporate services providers.

Meanwhile, Singapore’s economy has felt the chill across its luxury home space and shophouse market.

Israel-Hamas war

Hamas, the militant group governing the Gaza Strip, launched an attack on the south of Israel on Oct 7. Israel responded swiftly, declaring a war with deadly bombardments of Gaza.

The ensuing conflict had killed more than 20,000 people in Israel and at least 15,899 in Gaza as at Dec 22, according to authorities on both sides.

Global markets reacted by pushing up the price of oil and gold. Airlines are expected to come under pressure from higher fuel bills. Bloomberg reported that some have been snatching oil derivatives contracts to hedge against price surges.

As analysts cut target prices on Singapore Airlines, the counter has been trading lower since then.

The conflict’s impact on Singapore is expected to be small because of the country’s limited trade and investment links with either party, said Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong in November.

Political scandal in Singapore

Several members of Singapore’s Parliament found themselves the subject of scrutiny this year.

First, Ministers K Shanmugam and Vivian Balakrishnan made the news after it emerged they were renting colonial bungalows along Ridout Road.

Questions surfaced about how they could afford to do so and whether there had been any impropriety in the rental process, prompting a statement from the Singapore Land Authority that the rentals were done in full compliance with relevant procedures.

Checks by the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB) and Senior Minister Teo Chee Hean also uncovered no criminal wrongdoing or improper conduct.

Then, in July, the CPIB arrested Transport Minister S Iswaran and billionaire hotelier Ong Beng Seng. Both were released on bail. The bureau did not provide further details as investigations are ongoing.

After taking a leave of absence, Iswaran was interdicted from duty with a reduced monthly salary of S$8,500 until further notice.

In the same month, Speaker of Parliament Tan Chuan-Jin and Tampines GRC Member of Parliament (MP) Cheng Li Hui stepped down from their positions following revelations that they were in an “inappropriate relationship”.

Tan also resigned as president of the Singapore National Olympic Council.

Following his resignation, Seah Kian Peng was appointed Speaker of the House.

Meanwhile, Workers’ Party members Leon Perera and Nicole Seah resigned from their party. Perera also stepped down as MP for Aljunied GRC and Seah as president of the party’s youth wing.

Their resignations were prompted by the circulation of a video suggesting an “inappropriate exchange” between both parties.

US Treasury yield hits record high

The yield on America’s 10-year Treasury – a critical determinant of borrowing costs both in the US and around the world – rose as high as 5.021 per cent in late-October.

It has been 16 years since the UST 10Y yield crossed the 5 per cent mark.

Market watchers speculated at the time that 10-year yields would continue to push higher and remain elevated in 2024 as the central bank tries to tame soaring inflation.

On Dec 13, Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell indicated, however, that the central bank could begin to cut rates soon.

Banking service disruptions

Singapore’s largest lender DBS experienced multiple disruptions over the months of March, May, September and October.

The biggest incident, in October, was caused by an outage at one of the data centres of US-based data centre company Equinix. The same outage also led to hours of disruption for Citibank’s digital services around the same time as DBS.

The frequent disruptions led the Monetary Authority of Singapore to impose restrictions on the bank’s non-essential IT changes for six months. It also prohibited the lender from acquiring new business ventures during this period.

DBS’ mobile banking application continued to experience disruptions well into the end of 2023.

In November, UOB customers also experienced intermittent access to mobile banking and Internet banking services – marking the third disruption in a month to hit the financial institution.

Nets in the same month reported that its Nets QR and eNets services had “intermittent connectivity issues”.

Thai general election

The pro-democracy progressive Move Forward Party unexpectedly won the most seats in the general election held on May 14, signalling a broad desire for change in a country that had been ruled by military leader Prayut Chan-ocha for nine years.

Conservative parties and military-appointed senators blocked Move Forward Party leader Pita Limjaroenrat from leading the next administration, however.

Thailand’s Parliament eventually chose real estate tycoon Srettha Thavisin as the next prime minister.

Pita resigned as leader of Move Forward on Sep 15, but said he will stay active in the party. He vowed on Nov 9 to run for prime minister again.

Singapore presidential election

The Republic welcomed its ninth president Tharman Shanmugaratnam after his landslide win at the Sep 1 presidential election, which saw 2.7 million voters heading to the polls for the first time in 12 years.

Tharman received 70.41 per cent of valid votes cast, whereas ex-GIC chief investment officer Ng Kok Song got 15.72 per cent and former NTUC Income chief Tan Kin Lian bagged 13.87 per cent.

Four out of six presidential hopefuls made their intentions to run publicly known – including entrepreneur George Goh, the founder of Harvey Norman Ossia.

Goh’s application for a certificate of eligibility was rejected by the Presidential Elections Committee after he failed to meet shareholders’ equity and profitability criteria.

Singapore Turf Club

The Singapore Turf Club (STC) will run its final race next year, after almost two centuries of operations. In June, the government announced plans to take back 120 hectares of land – equivalent to 200 football fields – occupied by STC for redevelopment.

Real estate analysts believe tens of thousands of new homes could be built on the land, and noted that the last time such a large parcel of land was freed up for development was the Jurong Lake District – then touted as Singapore’s second central business district.

The horse-racing venue will host its final race meeting on Oct 5, 2024, and the facility will close by March 2027. Its last event will be the 100th Grand Singapore Gold Cup.

Singapore political succession

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong will hand over the reins to Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong before the next general election.

While he did not give an exact date, PM Lee said the handover would be done by the time the People’s Action Party celebrates its 70th birthday. The party was founded on Nov 21, 1954.