Opened one at DBS bank branch at Marina Bay Financial Centre.

You have to open securities trading account with it.

I opened one after GE 13. I realised how bad gerrymandering was and how screwed I will be if s**t hits the fan.

My vote piled up uselessly in an urban seat with big majority while rural seats with small majority are the ones that matter.

My advice is opening a Singaporean account is not worth it if less than SGD 30k. Interest rate is low so you have to invest in stock market (e.g. REIT or ETF).

You need 1 or 2 times cash collateral to SELL your shares due to how CDP is setup.

The money in Singapore is going to be there for the long-term (unless things go south in Malaysia) so how it appreciate to Ringgit is less important than beating inflation in Singapore. For now, just dollar cost averaging on STI ETF.

They are going to have Singapore Savings Bond soon. This will give fixed deposits in DBS bank a run for their money.

CDP accounts in Singapore is unique to each person. One CDP account can be linked to multiple brokerage accounts (e.g. buy with DBS Vickers and sell with Kim Eng). Once you buy through one brokerage and settle cost, the security is transferred to your CDP account. Your brokerage account has no idea that you still have the stock, so you might be short-selling when you sell any stock.

Since you are not working in SG, they will want cash collateral.

Might be different for others but this is the case for me.

Anybody who has DBS-Vickers account that can sell without collateral, let me know. I buy stock cash upfront.

Looks great especially no custody fees.

Have they charged you any annual fee for account?

If non-resident is allowed to open bank account and trading account, may recommend to dad for diversification.

Were you a non-resident when you opened the account?

Thank you for the info. Will let my dad know. It will be up to him to follow up on requirement and decide to proceed or not.

He has reached age to withdraw EPF but still keeps most of his money there.

If Zimbabwe levels of hyperinflation hits Malaysia (very, very unlikely), I can still rebound because I am young. It is the oldies that cannot take chances with their nest eggs.

You mentioning standard chartered trading account has jogged my mind back to end of 2013. I did consider Standard Chartered but did not find any examples of people who manage to open Standard Chartered bank account as non-resident in lowyat as opposed to DBS bank. Furthermore, I was a bit nervous about the fact that account is nominee account.

Since I am a small timer, may as well just go with DBS. Was caught out by how CDP is setup.

I remember I took the overnight KTM sleeper train to Singapore. It was RM 80 return for bunk.

You could arrive at early morning by sleeper, open account and take sleeper train back to KL. You don't even need to spend a night in Singapore.

Thanks for the advice. Definitely not going to ask him to put everything in SG. Maybe 10% as a hedge. He will need to consult relevant people, I am just giving an alternative to him. Just does not feel right to put all your eggs in one basket. The world is changing so fast. One moment you are up, the next you are down.

Yeah, Singapore would be affected too. Just the degree it will be affected. Just that it is convenient. One train ride away. Same language, culture. Another alternative is us brokerage account. Not the best place for an old man's retirement savings.

Curious whether Maybank SG allows you to open an account without being a Singaporean resident.

I like REITs because of the liquidity and hassle-free nature of investing in property through REITs.

The only problem with SG REITs is if there is a rights issue, you can't subscribe to it because you cannot provide a Singapore address. Other than that, it beats the MY REITs by a mile. No withholding tax, large portfolio (economics of scale & diversification), international exposure and more variety.

I stick with just STI ETF so I can adopt a simple investment strategy, buy less when expensive, buy more when cheap & sell when I need the money. Don't want to spend too much time on this.

orangbulu mentioned investing in US stocks. I think that is good too because of bigger market. Why invest in BAT Malaysia with 2X P/E when you can have international exposure of Philip Morris International at 1X P/E? Again, you can own a stake in publicly-traded oil company, Exxon Mobil at 1X P/E compared to owning small fish companies like Sapurakencana.

May I know what kind of information and supporting documents do they request?

But why resort to money changer, their rate is not much better than Maybank, sometimes worse.

It is too bad we don't have something like Currencyfair (Peer to peer currency exchange) for Malaysian Ringgit, only 0.5% commission to trade at mid-market rate.