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SCMP Reporter

Despite the recent volatility, the Singapore stock market is expected to greet the millennium with a record-breaking rush of new listings.

 Up to 20 new issues have been provisionally pencilled in for this month alone, the equivalent of one listing for every working day, provided they all proceed.

 Although Hong Kong has launched a Growth Enterprise Market (GEM), prospective issuers in Singapore include a high-technology SAR company.

 'We have been learning from the Nasdaq model,' Singapore Exchange securities trading head Ho Yew Mun said.

 Entrepreneurs are being drawn by the lure of recent record-breaking valuations and easier listing criteria for Internet firms.

 The Singapore exchange saw a torrent of listing applications towards the close of last year as the benchmark Straits Times Index soared towards record highs.

 The index was Asia's second-best benchmark last year, rising 78.03 per cent.

 Previously, Singapore firms wanting to list on the republic's main board required a minimum paid-up capital of S$15 million (about HK$70.21 million) and profits of at least $7.5 million over the past three years, including a minimum $1 million each year.

 The requirements for foreign-incorporated companies were double.

 Under newly liberalised listing rules, loss-making companies with good growth potential can list if they have at least $80 million in market capitalisation, irrespective of paid-up capital.

 Alternatively, firms with an aggregate pretax profit of at least $10 million within the one to two years qualify.

 These alternative requirements apply to both Singapore and foreign firms.

 'The new rules fit the new economy,' Mr Ho said, referring to the republic's push to become a high-technology hub.

 Some high-technology firms taking advantage of the new criteria towards the end of last year made spectacular debuts, which helped fuel the listing fever.

 Loss-making Internet telephone start-up MediaRing .com saw its share price treble on its first day of trade, making paper millionaires overnight out of about 30 of its full-time employees with stock options.

 MediaRing president Chua Kee Lock said: 'If the listing rules had not changed, we would not have been able to go to the market.'  Wong Toon King, chairman of Singapore's SilkRoute Holdings, which is incubating a number of Internet firms, said: 'Without this condition, we would never see a Yahoo! in Singapore and would fall further behind countries like the US in becoming part of the network economy.'  Mr Wong hopes to list his company on Singapore's main board later this year.

 Grande Electronics Holdings, a unit of Hong Kong's Grande Holdings, is among those to have been granted in-principle listing approval.

 I-Comm Technology, a telecommunications products arm of Hong Kong's IDT International, has also expressed an interest in a possible Singapore listing - as has Pearl Oriental Cyberforce for its four on-line arms.

 Mr Ho said: 'Singapore has in the past always given better valuations to technology and manufacturing firms.'   With the recent launch of Hong Kong's own second board for technology start-ups, GEM, the SAR hopes this will change.

 Warburg Dillon Read economist Cliff Tan said: 'Competition between GEM and Singapore means the playing field is not too uneven now.'  Even so, Mr Ho said Singapore maintained a few advantages.

 GEM is a second board, while loss-making firms can list on Singapore's main board and gain greater profile.

 Unlike Hong Kong, Singapore also allows founding shareholders to sell down some old shares at the time of their initial public offerings to realise some immediate gains.



Internet firms rush to take advantage of Singapore's liberal listing rules