The Monetary Authority of Singapore or (MAS), is the central bank and financial regulatory authority of Singapore. It administers the various statutes pertaining to money, banking, insurance, securities and the financial sector in general, as well as currency issuance and manages the foreign-exchange reserves. It was established in 1971 to act as the banker to and as a financial agent of the Government of Singapore.[4] The body is duly accountable to the Parliament of Singapore through the Minister-in-charge, who is also the Incumbent Chairman of the central bank. In May 2025 the fund had US$629 billion in assets under management.[5]
History
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) was founded on 1971-1-1 with authority to regulate and supervise banking and finance in Singapore. It coexisted with the Board of Commissioners of Currency, Singapore established in 1967 to issue the city-state's currency, with which it eventually merged in 2002. Prior its establishment, its roles were performed by various government departments and agencies. The acronym MAS resembles mas, the word for 'gold' in Malay, Singapore's national language—although the acronym is pronounced with each of its initial letters.[6]
During the COVID-19 pandemic, MAS brought forward its bi-annual meeting from some time in April to 30 March.[7] The MAS decided to ease the Singapore dollar's appreciation rate to zero percent, as well as adjust the policy band downwards, the first such move since the 2008 financial crisis. This marks the first time the MAS had taken these two measures together.[8]
Unlike many central banks around the world, the MAS is not independent from the Singapore Government—the MAS is under the purview of the Prime Minister's Office (PMO); chairmen of the MAS were either former or incumbent Minister for Finance. Some includes the former Prime Ministers or the current Deputy Prime Ministers.
List of chairmen
Policy
Since 1981, monetary policy in Singapore is mainly conducted through the management of the exchange rate (rather than inflation targeting) of the Singapore dollar, in order to promote price stability as a basis for sustainable economic growth. The exchange rate is an intermediate target of monetary policy in the context of the small and open Singapore economy (where gross exports and imports of goods and services are more than 300 percent of GDP and almost 40 cents of every Singapore dollar spent domestically is on imports), the exchange rate represents a significantly stronger influence on inflation than the interest rate. As a result, the nominal exchange rate, directly and indirectly, affects a wide range of prices in the Singapore economy, such as import and export prices, wages and rentals, consumer prices and output prices.[9]
MAS controls monetary policy through direct interventions in the foreign exchange markets and bears a stable and predictable relationship with the price stability as the final target of policy, over the medium-term. The Singapore dollar (SGD) is managed against a basket of currencies of Singapore's major trading partners and competitors; the various currencies are assigned weights in accordance with the importance of the country to Singapore's international trading relations (as shown below) and the composition of the basket is revised periodically to take into account any changes in trade patterns.[10]
Major trading partners of Singapore
Issuing banknotes and coins
Following its merger with the Board of Commissioners of Currency on 1 October 2002, the MAS assumed the function of currency issuance.
MAS has the exclusive right to issue banknotes and coins in Singapore. Their dimensions, designs and denominations are determined by the Monetary Policy Committee with Government approval. The banknotes and coins issued have the status of legal tender within the country for all transactions, both public and private, without limitation.
In December 2020, MAS approved digital bank licenses for 4 tech giants, Grab–Singtel consortium, Ant Group, Sea Group, and Greenland Financial consortium.[17] Grab-Singtel and Sea Group were awarded digital full banking licenses, while Ant Group and Greenland Financial were awarded digital wholesale banking licenses.[18] In May 2021, the ability to transfer money between Singapore's PayNow and Thailand's PromptPay was announced.[19]
Strategic initiatives
ASEAN Financial Innovation Network
ASEAN Financial Innovation Network (AFIN) is a non-profit organisation, established by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), ASEAN Bankers Association (ABA), and the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group in 2018. AFIN launched the Application Programming Interface Exchange (APIX), a global fintech marketplace and regulatory sandbox in 2018.[20][21]
Asian Institute of Digital Finance
The Asian Institute of Digital Finance (AIDF) is a research institute to enhance education, research and entrepreneurship in digital finance.[22] AIDF is a collaboration between the Monetary Authority of Singapore, the National Research Foundation and the National University of Singapore
See also
- Open Finance
- Securities commission
- List of banks in Singapore
- List of central banks
- List of financial supervisory authorities by country
External links
References
- Who We Are retrieved 5 November 2025^
- The World Fact Book - Singapore Central Intelligence Agency, retrieved 17 September 2014^
- Domestic Interest Rates - Singapore Overnight Rate Average (SORA) Table Monetary Authority of Singapore, retrieved 6 March 2025^