Daily Briefing: Temasek denies claim that CEO earns $100m a year; Pandemic heightens importance of food security, says experts

And remittance firm TranSwap in talks to close US$5-10m funding round.

From DealStreetAsia:

Temasek Holdings denied speculation that its Chief Executive Officer Ho Ching makes $100m (US$70m) a year.

“This claim is false,” the Singapore state investor said in a rare statement addressing the pay of the top executive, who’s also Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s wife.
“Furthermore, Ho Ching’s annual compensation is neither the highest within Temasek, nor is she amongst the top five highest-paid executives in Temasek.”

Temasek manages a portfolio that’s valued at $313b as of March 2019. It’s the biggest stakeholder in half of the country’s 10 largest companies by market value, including flag-carrier Singapore Airlines and DBS Group Holdings, Southeast Asia’s biggest lender.

The company issued a response following “chatter based on an Asian talk show commentary,” it said.

Read more here.

From Channel News Asia:

The COVID-19 pandemic has proven to be a wake-up call for Singapore on the issue of food security, say experts.

“The crisis could be a timely reminder of how fragile food security can be,” said Professor William Chen, director of the Nanyang Technological University’s Food Science and Technology programme.

Whilst there are other factors such as climate change which pose a threat to food security, these are relatively far off, he noted.

The coronavirus outbreak, as well as resulting lockdowns to stop its spread, has helped put a spotlight on the issue, said Prof Chen, who is also Michael Fam chair professor at NTU.

About 90% of Singapore’s food currently comes from overseas.

Read more here.

From e27:

Singapore-headquartered cross-border remittance company TranSwap is in talks to raise US$5-10 million in a fresh round of funding.

In a recent interview with e27, co-founder and CEO Benjamin Wong said TranSwap is looking to close the round “quite soon”.

To date, the fintech company has secured US$2.5m from investors, including Quest Ventures, and an unnamed family office and a few high net-worth individuals.

“We have raised about US$2.5 million to date, and we are going to close another bigger round soon,” he revealed to this publication. “We haven’t announced it yet but it will be quite soon. The amount is about US$5-10m.”

Read more here.