Trading link with SGX not priority now says Bursa CEO

A stock market trading link between the Singapore and Malaysia bourses first mooted in February 2018 but was called off by Malaysia’s new government months later, is “on the table” but no longer a “major priority” in its existing form, Bursa Malaysia chief executive Datuk Muhamad Umar Swift told The Straits Times in an exclusive interview. For Bursa, the more immediate task at hand is boosting trading volumes and retaining customers by improving its services and drawing more initial public offerings (IPOs) in the technology and healthcare sectors, among others. A boom in Internet trading since the pandemic and digital brokers availing easier access to the market has revolutionised the way people buy and sell stocks in the past three years. So any trading link between the Singapore Exchange (SGX) and Bursa must offer a much better proposition for it to take off, Muhamad Umar said.