Asia’s worst stock market last year is now one of the region’s top performers

Asia’s worst stock market last year is now one of the region’s top performers

SINGAPORE - Singapore's stock market is staging a strong comeback.The benchmark Straits Times Index ended 2020 as the worst performer in Asia, losing 11.8% through the year. But the STI climbed around 12.2% so far this year, and has become one of the region's top performers.The STI is a market capitalization weighted index that tracks the top 30 companies listed on the Singapore Exchange. As of Tuesday, as many as 12 of its constituent stocks have made double-digit gains this year.Taiwan was Asia's best-performing stock market as of Tuesday. The benchmark Taiwan Stock Exchange Capitalization Weighted Stock Index, or Taiex, slightly edged out the Singapore index with a 12.4% gain this year.

"Singapore is in a very good sweet spot, mainly because it's very cyclical," Joanne Goh, investment strategist at Singapore bank DBS, said last week.Markets or stocks that are "cyclical" rise and fall in conjunction with fluctuations of the economy. The STI is made up of a high proportion of financial and industrial stocks typically considered as cyclical.

Singapore stocks: 'One of the cheapest'

With the global economy recovering from the pandemic-induced recession, Singapore's stock market would do well, Goh said at a webinar outlining DBS' quarterly investment outlook.She added that valuation