Licence Application and Registration
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), as Singapore’s Central Bank is the authority providing a single licensing regime for financial institutions (FI) and intemediaries.
MAS regulates and licenses financial activity within these 4 main sectors:
1. Banking
The conduct of deposit-taking and lending activities in Singapore require a banking license. This includes full, wholesale and merchant banks, as well as finance companies.
These include the four new digital bank licenses recently awarded on Dec 6 2020. – Full digital bank licences were awarded to Grab-Singtel and SEA Ltd, whilst wholesale bank licenses were awarded to ANT Financial and Greenland Financial.
2. Capital Markets
Capital markets licenses cover a gamut of activities and entities, including the following:
- Fund Managers
- Corporate Finance Advisors
- Trustees
- Dealers
- Credit Rating Agencies
- REIT Managers
3. Insurance
An insurance-related licence is required for insurance companies and brokers in Singapore and is governed under the Insurance Act.
The main entity types covered are:
- Insurance & Reinsurance Companies
- Insurance Brokers
- Financial Advisers
4. Payments
Payment services and systems providers are regulated under the 2019 Payment Services Act of Singapore (PS Act). This covers both companies providing the actual payment services (service providers), and companies that facilitate the transfer of funds between multiple people and entities (system providers).
Under the PS Act, MAS segregates the licences under seven activity types. Find out more.
Activity A – Account issuance service. The service of issuing a payment account or any service relating to any operation required for operating a payment account, such as an e-wallet (including certain multi-purpose stored value cards) or a non-bank issued credit card.
Activity B – Domestic money transfer service. Providing local funds transfer service in Singapore. This includes payment gateway services and payment kiosk services.
Activity C – Cross-border money transfer service. Providing inbound or outbound remittance service in Singapore.
Activity D – Merchant acquisition service. Providing merchant acquisition service in Singapore where the service provider processes payment transactions from the merchant and processes payment receipts on behalf of the merchant. Usually the service includes providing a point-of-sale terminal or online payment gateway.
Activity E – E-money issuance service. Issuing e-money to allow the user to pay merchants or transfer to another individual.
Activity F – Digital payment token service. Buying or selling digital payment tokens (“DPTs”) (commonly known as cryptocurrencies), or providing a platform to allow persons to exchange DPTs.
Activity G – Money-changing service. Buying or selling foreign currency notes.
The full list of licenced FIs can be found on MAS’s site.
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