Daily Archives: August 18, 2020 (34 Articles Found)

More than 46,000 bottles of mosquito repellent given to students in some schools amid dengue outbreak

Kallang Wave Mall, Seoul Garden restaurant in Bugis Junction among places visited by Covid-19 cases while infectious

Sustainability a key goal of multiple ministries as Singapore looks to a green recovery: Grace Fu

Some restaurants turn a blind eye to ‘rule of 5’ to allow bookings for bigger groups

Some 100 new COVID-19 cases detected in cleared dorms, 7,000 workers quarantined

S’pore confirms 100 new COVID-19 cases, including one community infection who works at bus depot

Shoppers trickling back to Geylang malls, but sales remain low

OCBC floats new SORA-based home loan

Warehouse space occupancy grew 0.8ppt in Q2

Ascendas bags $100m through its first green bond

Quarz Capital and other Sabana REIT unitholders pen letter to MAS, SGX RegCo on ‘severe conflict of interest issues’ related to merger with ESR-REIT

The Edge

Members of the public concerned by hundreds gathering at Toa Payoh Town Park

AsiaOne

Construction begins on Tengeh Reservoir floating solar farm, touted as one of world’s largest

Zoom opens new data centre in Singapore

As US targets China tech, TikTok rival Bigo shifts servers from Hong Kong to Singapore

Pubs, KTV lounges still holding out for green light to reopen

Wage support extension expected, but recalibration sparks debate

Retail, F&B firms welcome further job support but face foreign labour, rental challenges

Built sector highlights other rising costs even as job support extended

Offer Singapore as safe meeting venue for travellers

Path safety a shared responsibility

Coffee with a conscience: This S’pore café chain hires and trains the disabled as baristas

Meet Lim Wei Jie, 28, and Nadi Chan, 27, the duo helming specialty coffee startup Foreword Coffee Roasters. Foreword is not your usual cafe joint with hipster interiors nor fancy menus; it serves coffee with a social mission.…

Vulcan Post

This S’pore millennial helms multiple bar businesses but Covid-19 didn’t ruin his ‘spirits’

Since 14, Roger Yip has been taking on part-time jobs in the F&B industry. He worked as a banquet server, restaurant assistant and barback at various establishments before finally stepping into the bar as a bartender. Realising the…

Vulcan Post

S-REIT report card: Here’s how Singapore REITs performed in third quarter 2020

Apart from just manoeuvring an economic downturn in 2020, everyone is also combating a very real health threat. Along with this, the properties – including REITs – that enable us to live, work and play have all been…

Dollars And Sense

Uptown at Farrer condo ad draws laughs (and criticism) as it goes viral

Condo developers are known be a painfully uncreative bunch. Imagine a panel of stone faces who are perpetually paranoid their projects might suffer because the word ‘luxurious’ did not appear at least three times in the same paragraph.…

99.Co

Customers love their furniture shop. So why are these sisters fighting to save it?

We just signed a one-year lease with our landlord. That was in Apr when Covid was widespread. We appealed to him: please, can you reduce the rental by 10%? He said no. He even wanted to increase the…

RICE

OrangeTee launches The Green Avengers social media campaign, raises awareness for sustainability in Singapore

OrangeTee & Tie has successfully launched its “The Green Avengers” campaign, in a bid to raise public awareness towards sustainable living in Singapore. The campaign aimed to crowdsource for innovative green ideas that anyone could do at home…

Zuu Online

Time to review requirements in resale flat transactions

Given higher HDB resale prices and given that million-dollar HDB resale units are becoming more common these days, the current option and exercise fees seem too little to be a fair consideration for the price of a unit.…

Why demolish vacant school building?

I am an alumnus of MacPherson Sec School (MSS), which was built in 1967. In 2003, the school merged with Woodsville Sec School, and the merged entity started operating in a new building next door, while the old…

Property market liquidity dipped 5% in Q2

Real estate investment volumes in Singapore remained muted for Q2 as its market liquidity fell 5% QoQ, according to RCA Capital Liquidity Scores. This figure may have been driven by falling office and retail rents, whilst the Lion…

More than 46,000 bottles of mosquito repellent given to students in some schools amid dengue outbreak

More than 46,000 bottles of mosquito repellent have been distributed to students at selected schools amid Singapore’s worst dengue outbreak in history. In all, 37 schools located in “large dengue cluster areas” have received the bottles of mosquito…

Kallang Wave Mall, Seoul Garden restaurant in Bugis Junction among places visited by Covid-19 cases while infectious

The Seoul Garden restaurant at Bugis Junction, a McDonald’s outlet in Bukit Batok as well as the Kallang Wave Mall were among the locations added to a list of public places that had been visited by Covid-19 cases…

Sustainability a key goal of multiple ministries as Singapore looks to a green recovery: Grace Fu

Several government ministries are tackling sustainability issues, not just MSE, its minister Grace Fu said on Tues, outlining how Covid-19 offers an opportunity for a global reset on a green future. Speaking at a virtual dialogue about what…

Some restaurants turn a blind eye to ‘rule of 5’ to allow bookings for bigger groups

In calling to make a table booking for a group of diners that number more than five, TODAY found that 19 out of 20 restaurants were willing to accept the request. And one among the 19 even suggested…

Some 100 new COVID-19 cases detected in cleared dorms, 7,000 workers quarantined

About 100 COVID-19 cases have been detected in foreign worker dormitories that were given the all-clear, resulting in some 7,000 workers being quarantined, said MOM and MOH on Tues. These cases – some of whom have resumed work…

S’pore confirms 100 new COVID-19 cases, including one community infection who works at bus depot

MOH confirmed another 100 COVID-19 cases in Singapore as of Tues, taking the country’s total to 55,938. Of the new cases, the lone community case is a 39-year-old Singaporean man who works at a bus depot in a…

Shoppers trickling back to Geylang malls, but sales remain low

There is good news and bad news for traders in Geylang. Shoppers have returned since phase two of Singapore’s reopening, but not in sufficient numbers, with sales a far cry from that of pre-Covid-19 days. Business owners at…

OCBC floats new SORA-based home loan

OCBC is launching a new SORA-based home loan referencing the three-month Compounded SORA published by MAS, it revealed. This follows after the bank released its first SORA-based home loan last July. Interest rates for this loan were based…

Warehouse space occupancy grew 0.8ppt in Q2

This chart from Edmund Tie revealed that the occupancy rate for warehouse space grew 0.8ppt QoQ to 88.3% in Q2. Occupancies of single-user factory spaces climbed, whilst it declined for business parks. The figures for multiple-user factories held…

Ascendas bags $100m through its first green bond

Ascendas Reit has raised $100m through its first green bond to be issued under a newly established green finance framework. The REIT’s first green bond, to be issued pursuant to its $7b Euro medium-term securities programme, has a…

Quarz Capital and other Sabana REIT unitholders pen letter to MAS, SGX RegCo on ‘severe conflict of interest issues’ related to merger with ESR-REIT

Activist investor Quarz Capital, Black Crane, and over 50 unitholders of Sabana REIT have, on Aug 17, written to MAS and SGX RegCo to seek MAS’s “guidance, clarity and support” on the “potential severe conflict of interest issues”…

The Edge

Members of the public concerned by hundreds gathering at Toa Payoh Town Park

Despite constant reminders to abide by safety distancing rules during the Covid-19 pandemic, many still continue to gather in public spaces. Over 500 domestic helpers were spotted gathering at Toa Payoh Town Park on Sun, reported Shin Min…

AsiaOne

Construction begins on Tengeh Reservoir floating solar farm, touted as one of world’s largest

The construction of a 60MWp floating PV system on Tengeh Reservoir has begun, announced PUB and Sembcorp Floating Solar Singapore on Tues. The system will enable Singapore to integrate green technology with water treatment, with enough clean energy…

Zoom opens new data centre in Singapore

Zoom Video Communications has opened a new data centre in Singapore, its first in SEA, it said on Tues. Use of Zoom’s video conferencing services has surged as huge numbers of people across the world work from home…

As US targets China tech, TikTok rival Bigo shifts servers from Hong Kong to Singapore

BIGO Technology, a smaller rival of embattled Chinese appmaker ByteDance, is shifting servers from Hong Kong to Singapore, out of the reach of a new national security law at a time when it is seeking to emphasise independence…

Pubs, KTV lounges still holding out for green light to reopen

Moving into new industries is easier said than done, said some nightlife operators hard-hit by restrictions still in place to curb the spread of Covid-19. With the lights out at their premises for over four months now, DPM…

Wage support extension expected, but recalibration sparks debate

Employers, labour leaders and economists had expected the JSS to be extended but they have different views on the length and level of the renewed move to protect jobs from the Covid-19 pandemic. Echoing the sentiments of many,…

Retail, F&B firms welcome further job support but face foreign labour, rental challenges

F&B and retail firms welcomed the extension of the JSS announced by DPM Heng Swee Keat on Mon. RAS said the JSS extension, as well as the S$320 million worth of SingapoRediscovers Vouchers also announced on Mon, will…

Built sector highlights other rising costs even as job support extended

Construction firms welcomed the extension to the JSS, although not all are sure that it will be sufficient to get them back on their feet in seven months’ time. Selena Ling, head of treasury research & strategy, OCBC,…

Offer Singapore as safe meeting venue for travellers

Almost all countries have either closed their borders or will continue to impose strict inbound and outbound rules for a while more. But crisis always brings opportunity. Singapore can be the first to offer itself as a “safe…

Path safety a shared responsibility

We have heard diverse views from both pedestrians and active mobility device users. Some have encountered inconsiderate device users who do not dismount in crowded spaces, while others have seen pedestrians who continue to use their mobile devices…