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Biggest news in Singapore yesterday was the merger between Uber’s Southeast Asia wing and Grab. This is not something new. After years of fighting and bleeding money in markets all around the world, Uber decided to try a different route and has been pa…
This quote was the reason that convinced me to invest instead of speculating, to invest long-term instead of short-term. Investing to me is putting money to work to build the future. That is why we say “invest in infrastructure”, “invest in human capit…
Budget 2018 was announced 2 days ago on 19 February 2018. Took us a while to digest everything, especially the 2% GST hike despite the budget surplus we got. Nonetheless, after 2 days of reading, these are some of the infographics that we thought …
After years of fighting for dominant market share, Uber has finally throw in the towel and decided to sell Grab a majority stake in its Southeast Asian unit to its regional competitor Grab. This decision will have important effects in the market especially for existing players such as current taxi operators. This trend is not its first as Uber is losing its market share against region-focused players such as Lyft, Didi Chuxing and Grab. A good case study to evaluate its market impacts is China.
China market
Several years before Uber conceded its Southeast Asian territory, it lost its fight in China against Didi Chuxing. The China taxi industry is huge with an estimated of 1.1 billion daily commutes. Even with such market size, the ride-hailing market has since consolidated largely between traditional taxi operators and tech platforms such as Didi Chuxing. Different from Singapore, the China ride hailing market has consolidated with Didi Chuxing being the main player, possessing more than 80% of the market. This could likely be a key movement after Southeast Asia’s consolidation.
Having a monopolistic market as a ride hailer, Didi Chuxing has reigned in on discounts and bonuses for both drivers and consumers. The discount-centric model was unsustainable and the company is transiting back to profit-focused model. Consumers previously attracted by the lower fares are now looking to switch back to taxi operators as they are more affordable comparing to surge pricings. Ridership dropped by 40% for some time after subsidies were withdrawn. Although the national government has lifted regulations governing ride-hailing, local cities implemented their own rules specifying stringent criteria to qualify as a private hire driver. For example, Beijing and Shanghai require all drivers to have a local residence permit before they can drive. This resulted in a significant drop in supply of drivers and indirectly raising the price paid by consumers. Consumers are also finding it more difficult to hail a ride on the app. There is prevalent negative consumer feedback where 81.7% of consumers find it more difficult to hail a ride. As such, consumers are slowly turning back to taxis as a solution. This can potentially increase the growth of China taxi market to moderate as parties look to negotiate deals that will appease the majority.
The current SG market
January 2018 is a great month for the stock market, and probably a good start too!The Straits Times Index (STI) is up about 3.4% for the month of January.The S&P500 is up about 5.6% in the same month.But does this mean that stocks will continue to …
The Straits Times reported a few days ago that EZ Link Cards will soon be accepted in hawker centres and subsequently with other merchants. This is all in a bid to move Singapore towards a more cashless society. Although this is a good initiative – and…
Netflix released their latest quarter’s earnings results and it exceeded Wall Street’s expectations for it.Shares of Netflix went highly by nearly 15% yesterday and it is currently now worth USD 100 billion.You can refer to more of the results HERE.Wha…
Just a few days into the New Year of 2018, I think it would be apt to review the movements in the cryptocurrency market in 2017. After all, the buzzword for 2017 was "Cryptocurency". A self-proclaimed "early adopter" of cryptocurrency where I started mining for Bitcoin before it became cool, cryptocurrency has reached new hypes where more people are entering and identifying themselves as "experts
2017 has been a rather bullish year for Singapore’s residential property market, with a healthy number of transactions over the past few months. As the number of transactions increases so does the number of mortgages. As such, if you wonder…
The Singapore Savings Bond (SSB)
It is a special Singapore Government bond, issued by the Singapore Government and sold to the public as a form of savings.
Introduced as another form of investment and savings plan for people living in Singapore
The…
