HSBC report says majority mainly use their mobile banking app for checking account balances and paying bills.

 

Whilst the majority of Singaporeans conduct their day-to-day transactional banking online, digital wealth investing remains a bridge too far according to research by HSBC.

Surveying more than 1,100 Singaporeans on their digital banking activity, the research found that the vast majority use their mobile banking app for basic banking transactions such as checking account balances (75 percent) and paying bills (67 percent).

However, only 21 percent have made long-term investments, such as bonds, using their smartphones while 25 percent have history of using their mobile banking app to make short-term investments such as equities or unit trusts.

Ian Yim, head of Wealth & International, HSBC Bank (Singapore) explained: “Our report shows that Singaporeans are ‘bill payers’ and not ‘investment makers’ when it comes to mobile banking. This could be due to a general lack of confidence or knowledge of how they can get started on investing. What this tells us is that more needs to be done to help Singaporeans be equipped with the basic investment know-how. Providing easily accessible online financial education resources and simple investment platforms will be key.” This year, the bank has introduced 50 remote-enabled processes and customer servicing journeys to address this.

He added: “COVID-19 has forced many parts of life to be conducted virtually. Whilst Singaporeans have not fully embraced investing digitally, we are starting to see behaviour shift. Between January and May this year, we saw self-directed investments into equities and unit trusts via our Internet banking platform growing 3 times and 2.5 times respectively from the same period last year. As Singapore moves towards economic re-opening, we expect these trends to continue as challenges around digital familiarity and trust would have been cracked.”

 

(** PHOTO CREDIT: Unsplash/Adam Nieścioruk)

 

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