What happened
Speaking at the Wealth Management Institute's Global-Asia Family Office Summit on 5 October 2026, Deputy Prime Minister and MAS Chairman Gan Kim Yong reported progress on private bank onboarding. Nearly half of the new accounts opened by Private Banking Industry Group member banks in the previous three months were opened within a month. The industry aims for a median onboarding time of under one month by the end of 2026.
Why it matters
Faster onboarding is welcome for families relocating wealth to Singapore, but banks' anti-money laundering obligations have not changed. Delays most often come from inconsistent evidence about beneficial ownership, tax residence and the origin of assets. That is especially true for families with assets in several jurisdictions, operating businesses or wealth built over generations.
Tax records are among the most persuasive evidence a family can give, because they provide an independent chronology. Returns, assessments, residence certificates and records of tax paid on business sales or dividends corroborate how wealth was built. Inconsistencies cause problems: income that does not match the narrative, gaps in years, or ownership charts that differ from filings. They lead to follow-up questions, and sometimes to refusal.
What to do now
Before approaching banks, prepare a single, reconciled source-of-wealth pack:
- a narrative of how the wealth was created;
- a current ownership chart;
- historical tax returns and assessments;
- evidence of tax paid on major liquidity events;
- tax residence certificates;
- the CRS and FATCA classification of each entity.
Review the pack for consistency and use the same version with every bank. Good preparation does not guarantee faster approval, but poor preparation almost always causes delay.
Key resources
General information only; not tax or legal advice.
