Money Matters with Hongbin Jeong and Chua Tian Tian

In our increasingly digitised world, where everything from our phones to our televisions is “smart,” it should come as no surprise that virtual reality and augmented reality are starting to play a role in the design industry. So how can VR empower home owners to become designers? Prime Time's Timothy Go and Bharati Jagdish speak with Muzhaffa Kamal, Co-founder and CEO of Luucid to find out. 

In the Spotlight on Prime Time, Bharati Jagdish is joined by Jonathan Frewin, Senior journalist with BBC World Service Partner Hub in London, as theytake a look at some news moving the markets, with focus on oil prices as well as interest rate decisions from major banks, plus US President Joe Biden will be hosting a summit of African leaders in Washington later this week. What’s on the agenda and why it matters. 

The sustainability momentum in Singapore has accelerated strongly in the past 12 months, with more business leaders saying they now work for organisations with sustainability strategies and policies. Prime Time’s Bharati Jagdish speaks with Yoon Young Kim, Cluster President, Singapore, Malaysia and Brunei, Schneider Electric to find out how the sustainability landscape in Singapore will continue to evolve in 2023.

It’s all about private equity real estate investments today. Japan has been named by a number of analysts we spoke to on the show as a market to enter thanks to its ultra-easy monetary policy.  But for how long will lower interest rates last especially with Tokyo’s inflation growing at the fastest pace in 40 years in November? Which are the other up and coming markets for private real estate assets? And will we see a value pick up in countries such as the UK? And while investors have turned to private markets to shield themselves from volatilities in public assets for a good part of this year, we saw some investors trying to pull their money out of several private REITs including the US$125 billion unlisted Blackstone Real Estate Investment Trust or BREIT.  So how concerned should we be?  On Market View, Prime Time’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian sat down with Peter Young, CEO and Co-founder at Q Investment Partners for more.

Company news takes the centre stage today as we deep dive into key developments for the week.  Within the US, Morgan Stanley is embarking on a fresh round of job cuts amounting to some 1,600 workers or 2 per cent of its total workforce. Question is - has the latest round of tech layoffs sparked wider contagion in other sectors?   Also, Walmart CEO has been quoted saying that theft is becoming a bigger issue at US stores but what would this mean for retailers in the industry? Meanwhile, Taiwan chipmaker TSMC upped its investment at its new Arizona plant to US$40 billion but are chipmakers bidding goodbye to Taiwan?  On Market View, Prime Time’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian sat down with David Kuo, Co-Founder, The Smart Investor for more. They also talked about Singapore’s blue chip stocks, companies paying dividends in December and the 3 investment decisions one should make before 2022 ends. 

With the festive season fast approaching, consumers will now be compelled to manage their budget even more carefully, all while dealing with an inflationary environment, a possible recession and the impending GST rate hike in January 2023. This raises the question: how should consumers manage their portfolios in line with their 2023 resolutions, and still be able to enjoy the festive season? Prime Time's Bharati Jagdish speaks with Laurent Bertrand, CEO and Co-Founder of BetterTradeOff to get some tips. Produced and edited by Anthea Ng (nganthea@sph.com.sg)

The recovery from the pandemic, inflation, a slowdown in China, the ongoing reverberations of the conflict in Ukraine and the intensifying effects of climate-related hazards have resulted in a time of intense pressure for global cities all over the world. In the face of global adversity, how are the largest urban centres in Asia Pacific and the world adapting? Prime Time's Bharati Jagdish finds out from Soon Ghee Chua, Senior Partner, Kearney.

Having been forced to adopt hybrid learning at the onset of the pandemic in 2020, learners in a recent global survey have expressed their desire for the method to be normalised for the foreseeable future. Is hybrid learning here to stay and what are the pros and cons? In the Spotlight on Prime Time, Bharati Jagdish finds out more from Ethan Li, Vice President of AvePoint and Chief Strategy Officer of MaivenPoint. Produced and edited by Anthea Ng (nganthea@sph.com.sg)

Forget ransomware – we’re now fighting a ‘ransom-war'. Known ransomware payments totaled a jaw dropping $400 million globally in 2020 and topped $81 million just in the first quarter of last year. In light of this, how can the cybersecurity industry adapt to this evolution? Prime Time’s Bharati Jagdish finds out from Shahnawaz Backer, Senior Solution Architect, F5 Inc. 

We’ll pick up where we left off with the US market today. In the US, the country’s trade deficit widened for a second month in October, but less than what economists had expected in a Bloomberg poll. But how should we be reading into this piece of data, and how would that fit in the bigger picture along with the hotter than expected jobs report and service industry activity in November? What would this mean for the Federal Reserve and market participants then? Aside from the US, the European Central Bank and the Bank of England are also set to announce their rate decisions next week, but what are analysts projecting for now? On Market View, Prime Time’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to  Anthony Joseph Raza, Head of Multi-Asset Strategy, UOB Asset Management.