Chinese social media is buzzing with speculation about Singapore's downturn. Various posts claim that luxury brands are fleeing Marina Bay Sands and the Christmas decorations on Orchard Road seem sparse this season. Some sarcastically refer to Singapore as “洗钱坡” (Xǐqiánpō, meaning “Money Laundering Hill”), which plays on the Chinese name “新加坡” (Xīnjiāpō), alongside predictions that Singapore is collapsing after being abandoned by speculative capital.
However, the data reflects another perspective. According to data from Euromonitor International, Singapore's luxury goods market is expected to grow by 7-9% in 2025, reaching a value of up to 13.9 billion Singapore dollars, surpassing Japan, China, and South Korea. This is not a collapse, but a restructuring. Therefore, to understand this change, we must go back to 2019.
From Hong Kong to Singapore: The great exodus of 2019.
When the protests against the extradition law in Hong Kong escalated in 2019, the financial geography of Asia began to change, with people saying, 'What many are really worried about is that more companies and capital are moving to Singapore.'
At that time, 23% of companies with offices in Hong Kong were considering relocating their operations, and nine out of ten companies chose Singapore as their primary destination. When the National Security Law in Hong Kong began to take effect in June 2020, the outflow intensified.
Hong Kong's strict pandemic control policies during COVID-19 also led to more financial personnel and businesses flowing to Singapore, with the value of assets under management in Singapore's asset management industry doubling in just 6 years, reaching about 4 trillion USD, with 80% being foreign capital. Large asset managers like BlackRock expanded their operations in Singapore while Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan shut down all equity investment teams in Hong Kong.
The anti-corruption campaign and the outflow of Chinese capital.
Moreover, there is another driver of investment due to Xi Jinping starting a vigorous anti-corruption campaign after coming to power in 2012, which is considered the largest in the history of the Chinese Communist Party.
Under this campaign that emphasizes managing 'both the tiger and the fly,' more than 4.7 million officials have been punished since 2012, including 553 at the ministerial level and above. Additionally, operations like Sky Net and Fox Hunt are pursuing offenders in over 90 countries while tracking down billions of hidden funds abroad.
According to data from the Mercator Institute for China Studies (MERICS) in Germany, since 2015, the Chinese economy has faced capital outflow issues, with risks of currency devaluation and intensified anti-corruption measures. Investors and depositors began moving their assets out of China, with outflows so high that the People's Bank of China had to use over 1 trillion USD in foreign exchange reserves to protect the exchange rate.
These large amounts of money flowed into Singapore, with the number of family offices in Singapore increasing from 400 in 2020 to 1,100 by the end of 2022. The nickname '洗钱坡' (money laundering hill) thus emerged in this context.
The battle for Asia's crypto hub.
The demand for money laundering thus converged with the cryptocurrency industry when China implemented ICO restrictions in 2017 and banned them in 2021. Major Chinese crypto trading platforms, including Binance, Huobi, Bybit, and OKX, moved their headquarters to Singapore simultaneously. Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of Ethereum, stated that Singapore has become a hub for the crypto community.
Why Singapore? Because this is considered the only viable answer in Asia.
Japan has learned painful lessons before. In 2014, Mt. Gox, a platform in Tokyo that once handled over 70% of Bitcoin transactions worldwide, collapsed after being hacked for over 500 million USD. The Japanese Financial Services Agency (JFSA) responded by issuing the world's first registration system for crypto trading platforms in 2016, before the platform Coincheck lost 534 million USD in NEM tokens in January 2018, leading to even stricter regulations.
South Korea also faced a turning point in 2017 when the crypto wave surged, leading to massive speculative demand, resulting in the phenomenon known as 'kimchi premium,' where Bitcoin prices in Korea were significantly higher than the global market. The authorities implemented strict measures, and the FATF introduced the Travel Rule in 2019 to facilitate customer information exchange for high-value transactions.
In contrast, Singapore chose a different approach. Although the Payment Services Act (PSA) was enacted in 2019, the regulatory framework remains relatively flexible, allowing special exemptions for foreign crypto companies to operate temporarily without a license, as long as they do not serve retail customers in Singapore. Everyone in the industry agrees that if you want to do blockchain business in Asia, Singapore is the place to be.
Token2049, the largest blockchain conference in Asia, moved from Hong Kong to Singapore in 2022 due to Hong Kong's Zero-COVID policy and regulatory risks in China. The number of participants grew from 7,000 in 2022 to 20,000 in 2024, reaching a record of 25,000 in 2025.
Key turning points: Terra-Luna, FTX, and the Fujian gang.
However, 2022 also marked a significant turning point for Singapore.
The Terra-Luna collapse in May and the FTX bankruptcy in November are both connected to Singapore. Additionally, Three Arrows Capital (3AC), headquartered in Singapore, also faced bankruptcy. In 2023, a money laundering scandal involving a Fujian gang worth 2.3 billion USD occurred, with ten suspects from Fujian province smuggling into Singapore using fake identities to launder money obtained from illegal gambling and cyber fraud.
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has thus changed its regulatory stance, requiring digital token service providers (DTSP) to obtain licenses effective June 30, 2025. All companies in Singapore providing services to foreign crypto customers must apply for a license without a transition period.
Bitget and Bybit have transferred some teams to Dubai and Hong Kong, resulting in hundreds of jobs in Singapore being at risk. A Hong Kong politician has announced an invitation for companies from Singapore to relocate to Hong Kong.
By the end of 2025, there are about 35 companies holding a Major Payment Institution (MPI) license, including Coinbase, Crypto.com, Circle, and Upbit.
The luxury goods market in Thailand: Who leaves, who stays?
The changes in the crypto industry and the structure of the luxury goods market follow the same basic logic.
According to Henley & Partners, the influx of billionaires into Singapore decreased by 54% from 3,500 people in 2024 to 1,600 in 2025, while requests for establishing family offices by Chinese nationals dropped by 50% from the peak in 2022. Foreign property buyers, excluding permanent residents, accounted for only 1% of private property transactions in Q1 2024, down from 6.4% the previous year, directly resulting from the increase in ABSD tax to 60%.
But looking at the overall picture, it is different.
Singapore's luxury goods market is expected to grow by 7-9% in 2025, according to forecasts by Euromonitor, with the secret lying in the 242,400 millionaires in Singapore. The average household income in Singapore has been continuously increasing for five years, thus local wealth is filling the gap left by high-spending foreign tourists.
The real estate market reflects the same picture, with the foreign ownership rate in the Core Central Region (CCR) dropping to a 17-year low, while locals accounted for two-thirds of all high-end real estate transactions. Furthermore, the price gap between the CCR and other areas has narrowed to just 4-6%, marking the smallest gap since 2000.
The widespread claim that luxury brands are fleeing Marina Bay Sands is also not true. In July 2025, Chanel opened a temporary 900 square meter boutique at MBS while its flagship store was being renovated in preparation for a grand reopening in 2027, which is hardly the behavior of a brand that is retreating. Additionally, during the Christmas season of 2025, there were regular night shows between Gucci and Chanel.
Adjusting strategies, not collapsing.
Some suggest that what is happening in Singapore can be better understood as a strategic risk reduction, not a collapse.
This trend can be seen in various sectors, with a shift from speculative foreign capital to the wealth base of locals, from unlicensed crypto operators to licensed institutional players, and from real estate speculation to sustainable local ownership. The Singaporean government, having learned from the Fujian scandal and the FTX collapse, seems to prioritize long-term stability over short-term growth.
The narrative of Singapore collapse circulating on Chinese social media seems to amplify negative signals, such as the exodus of billionaires and crypto investors, while neglecting positive information, such as the growth in luxury goods sales and the expanding wealth base of locals.
The opinion of one X user may reflect the truth better: '消费转级, 不是消费降级' — that is, restructuring consumption, not a decline in consumption.
Therefore, it can be said that Singapore is not collapsing, but rather seriously restructuring itself.