Barging blindly into Singapore’s construction boom could be a bust for some investors

Those dipping their toes in now are no longer buying the boom, but betting that these companies can manage their costs

FOR years, Singapore’s construction sector was the proverbial “ugly duckling” of the local bourse – a messy, low-margin business plagued by labour crunches, fluctuating raw material costs, and the lingering hangover of pandemic-era delays.

Investors, quite reasonably, preferred the steady dividends of the banks or the defensive allure of Singapore-listed real estate investment trusts (S-Reits).

But look at the scoreboard now, and the narrative has shifted with the speed of a high-rise crane.

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