SG Morning Highlights | SIA Group Posts 15.8% Increase in Passenger Traffic in December

Advancers / Decliners is 47 to 65, with 53.18 million securities worth S$53.51 million changing hands.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Singapore are expected to face continued or even intensified cost pressures in 2024, despite the country's cooling inflation. Industry leaders have identified four areas of concern, namely rents, labour costs, utilities and fuel charges, and pass-through costs from suppliers. The president of the Association of Small and Medium Enterprises (Asme) has noted that rental charges for commercial and industrial spaces are expected to increase, with retail leases seeing a rise of between 3 to 10 percent. SMEs are advised to brace for another year of rising costs.

According to RHB, Singapore's private residential market is expected to have a sluggish year in 2024 due to easing home price growth and falling rents. RHB property and REIT analyst Vijay Natarajan has projected that private home prices will remain muted in the first half of the year, with interest rates expected to remain elevated and cautious buying sentiment persisting. Natarajan predicts that home prices will rise by around 1% to 4% in 2024, slower than last year's estimated price growth of 6.7% and the 8.6% spike in 2022. He also expects rents to decrease across the board by around 5% to 10% this year due to high vacancy rates caused by project completions. However, RHB sees City Developments Ltd outperforming the market as the property heavyweight has already sold a significant portion of its Singapore residential landbank in the past two years.