Efforts to improve stock market should also scrutinise Catalist

IN A speech to mark Singapore Exchange’s (SGX) 25th anniversary, chairman Koh Boon Hwee said “it will take courage, a willingness to take risks, and a collective commitment to change’’ to improve the local stock market.

One area this could apply to is Catalist.

Set up in 2007 as the successor to the previous second board known as Sesdaq, Catalist was modelled after overseas markets such as London’s AIM, which essentially meant that supposedly promising companies, most of which were loss-making, should still be allowed to list – provided they could find sponsors to back them.