SINGAPORE: In keeping with market expectations, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) maintained its exchange rate-based monetary policy on Monday, January 29, for the third straight meeting.
The Singapore Central Bank stated that it would “maintain the prevailing rate of appreciation” of its policy band for the Singapore dollar nominal effective exchange rate (S$NEER) in its monetary policy statement.
Both the width and the amount of centering of the policy band remain unchanged.
In this planned review, all 13 analysts surveyed by Reuters had predicted that MAS would postpone changing its policy.
The last alteration to the monetary policy was a re-centering of the mid-point of its policy band in October 2022. This was made during the two policy reviews in 2023.
In contrast to the majority of central banks, which control interest rates, MAS controls monetary policy by allowing the local currency to fluctuate against the currencies of its principal trading partners within a transparent range called the S$NEER.
