oh wait i forgot, if you have valid employment letter u can open OCBC sg acct before stepping foot into SG https://www.ocbc.com/personal-banking/digit...sg-bank-account no fall-below fee for the first 12 months

If you are working in Singapore, please get yourself this account. DBS My Account.
https://www.dbs.com.sg/personal/deposits/sa...unts/my-account
Totally no fall below fees and it is multi currency account. I keep only SGD0.10 inside my account.

Thanks for the advice presented guys! I have been looking in to it and it seems the one Ramjade presented might be the best option.

- DBS MY Account for salary purpose and deposits to IBKR, there doesn't seem to be any fees or minimum/initial deposits required at all for this DBS account, largest coverage/branch.
- Transfer from DBS to CIMB SG and then CIMB MY for cheapest transfer back to Malaysia.

3 banks is all I need I suppose, my Maybank savings account can just leave it dormant with RM20 inside.

You just need DBS My account and Cimb SG. No need for Maybank SG. If you want to squeeze some interest out look for those conditional high yield account but they have fall below fees, need to spend some money. See is the pros worth it for you.

Oh I was referring to my current Maybank MY account, which will be mostly redundant once I start work over there I guess.

I thought about it, being in Singapore I will probably pool most of my investments in IBKR so majority of my savings will go there. But I still need some form of reserve for emergency use so it will sit in a bank account.

DBS MY Account - has no fees and minimum/initial deposit, but interest is only at 0.05%.

OCBC 360 - 1000 SGD initial deposit and minimum balance of 3000 SGD to avoid fall below fee of 2 SGD (waived for 1st year), interest is at least 1.60% with the option to go higher by saving or spending more, don't see any other fees other than fall below fee.

Decisions. Decisions. Decisions.

By the way, is everyone here mostly investing in IBKR only?

SwarmTroll bcos this is a sg bank thread. so naturally the IBKR users will be here

there's Moomoo/webull/FSMOne and even tiger brokers users in this subforum

You can buy SSB (not worth it since interest have come down a lot).
You can money market fund (MMF) for quick access to your funds Vs SSB.
I won't use those conditional high yield account. I am a MMF user.

Reasons
1. Fall below fees
2. Need to lock up money in the account
3.If you want to maximise interest, need to buy unit trust or use their brokerage

Ah yes, I guess each platform has their pros and cons, will look to see which is suitable.

Ah yes! MMF, I almost forgot about them. Higher interest and almost as liquid as savings account (T+1 working days) for withdrawals, minus extra conditions but slightly riskier. You are using MMF through IBKR? Actually being in Malaysia, you would use a local MMF platform I suppose.

I use moomoo sg for my MMF. Link directly to DBS. I don't use IBKR MMF. They don't have for Singapore anyway. Only for US or European countries.

Thanks for mentioning MMF to me, I forgot about them myself. Now it makes sense for me to use DBS My Account as salary deposit and the MMF as my liquid fund, don't have to be tied to the terms and conditions of something like OCBC360 and still having equivalent or higher interest returns.

What other investment advice could you share to me?
Do you perhaps invest in Individual shares/ETFs/etc. in IBKR?

This post has been edited by SwarmTroll: Jul 30 2025, 12:14 AM

you can use the other threads in this sub forum, esp the Stock Exchange sub forum, to ask

maybe u can elaborate more on your investment experience so far. e.g., beginner in investing / already own malaysian stocks / what's your expectation in investing in stocks. and so on

This post has been edited by Medufsaid: Jul 30 2025, 07:00 AM

I know some Singaporean use those conditional accounts cause
1. Salary crediting
2. Spending

These 2 are easy to achieve.

Alternatively you can use Cimb fast saver. Not sure what is the rate for Cimb.

For ATM purpose, DBS, OCBC, UOB.

For cheapest to maintain DBS My account and Cimb fast saver

For conditional account so many available. See which one you want to use.

Nothing just the basic. Live below your means, have at least 50% savings as much as you can and invest it. That's all What you want to invest is entirely up to you.

This post has been edited by Ramjade: Jul 30 2025, 07:13 AM

Mostly beginner I would say, it's a new learning experience everyday. Some investments in ASNB, StashAway (withdrew), Versa (withdrew), Foreign US Share by previous company I worked at, Rakuten Trade but stopped awhile ago, Crypto (Binance), etc.

Expectation is to beat ASNB/Retirement fund returns mostly.

CIMB Fast Saver has better rates and cheap to maintain in comparison to the one I was also looking at which is UOB One Account. UOB One Account is however cheaper to maintain compared to DBS Multiplier or OCBC360 (1000 SGD Minimum vs 3000 SGD Minimum).

I will probably go with UOB because of branch/atm/presence in SG for salary/spending purposes. I will still open CIMB Fast Saver for transferring money to Malaysia at best rates.

Live below your means and reach savings of 50% salary. Great motto indeed, you seeking early retirement?

UOB one is great choice for salary crediting and spending. Remember to take a look at Singapore blogs to see which conditional high interest account suits you.

Simple S&P500 will beat any ASNB returns. If you want more returns, VGT or IUIT. If I would invest into ETF, I would pick either VGT or IUIT

Yes. I am gunning for early retirement. I am already LEAN FIRE. Aiming for FAT FIRE.

If you are buying stocks, do not diversify so much. Focus on 20 high quality companies. A good place you can start is consistent high gross profit of 40%, ROE of min 20% operating profit of min 20%, debt to equity of 0.5 and below for past 3 and 5 years. Yes there will be quality companies that do not fulfiled the above criteria like Costco.
https://fiscal.ai/screener/

If you don't know what you are buying or why you are buying better focus on ETF.

Why VGT over QQQ?

I will look in to those ETFs you mentioned. Do you perform DCA for your investments?

For stocks I would imagine not so much for DCA but for ETFs perhaps yes. Time in the market is better than timing the market as the saying goes.

what's this incoming foreign funds? I convert MYR to SGD in Wise then transfer from Wise to my HSBC SG acc, so far no charges.

MasBoleh! Wise SGD cash transfer to HSBC SG - SGD cash balance is considered local transfer. all Wise cash are located at their origin country.

e.g., USD in USA, GBP in UK, EUR in SEPA

incoming foreign funds will kick in if transferring money to different country. in elea88's case, USD from USA enter DBS sg (USD in SG)

let me give you my answer. Money that are transferred out of Malaysia is been categorized as oversea investments. Travelling and Leisure has its own categorization. The money will not be touch till I retired or when I need to migrate out hurriedly. If migration does become a need, Singapore is more of a backup plan, I have my other plan to migrate to other places. Just that, it's always good to have a backup plan just in case

I just read a bit this thread, my apology for not following all the messages. From what I read, it seems like Maybank SG and CIMB SG no longer accept cash transfer from Wise, thus now there was this incoming fee topic.