Minibond Series 5

PUBLISHED IN STRAITS TIMES ONLINE FORUM

Dear Sir/Madam,

My wife and I are joint account holders of Maybank Singapore. We purchased S$100K of Minibonds Series 5 from Maybank's investment banker around Aug'07. We were under the impression then that these were supposedly very safe bonds. Every few months, I'll even call up Maybank to inquire the well-being of our Minibonds and whether I should still hold on to them. Each time, I was informed that these bonds were still sound, and there wasn't any need to bail out.

Now that Lehman is bankrupt, and the public disclosure that our Minibonds has in fact, nothing at all to do with bonds, but are instead CDO-related derivatives, we are extremely disappointed, distressed and upset with Maybank's lack of professionalism and very poor-product knowledge. The investment advisers are more interested in closing the deal and going through the motion during the investors' risk-analysis.

We believe there are many more thousands of retail investors in Singapore whom are similarly short-changed by the high profile advertisements, aggressive marketing, and misleading sounding products such as "Minibonds", "High notes", etc, which gives a false impression of highly rated bonds or notes. This is compounded by the lack of explanation and product knowledge by the private-bankers/investment advisors. Obviously, no one of sound mind will be willing to accept a 5% return for taking on the risk of CDO-related derivatives!

We fully understand the concept of buyers beware. However in this situation, how is the layman supposed to beware of what they're being sold when the 60-odd pages of prospectus is filled with legalese and technical jargon that even the sellers themselves do not fully comprehend!

We seriously implore MAS and Maybank to investigate and not condone such unethical practices, lest Singapore's hope of becoming a leading fund-management and financial centre is tarnished.

Your faithfully,
Ngo Chee Keong (Mr)
Ng Wee Lay (Ms)

CC: Maybank, ST Forum, MAS, CASE, Mr. Tharman Shanmugaratnam - Minister for Finance, Mrs Lim Hwee Hua - Senior Minister of State for Finance