Singapore’s investment banking sector saw a 3.1% year-on-year expansion, generating US$418.4 million in fees during the first half of 2026. Data from the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) highlights that Singapore’s growth stood in sharp contrast to the broader Southeast Asian region, where fee pools compressed by 6% year-on-year. On a wider scale, investment banking fees across the Asia-Pacific region excluding Japan slipped 3% to US$12.1 billion, while Japan experienced a significant 23% surge to reach US$2.9 billion. Ultimately, Singapore’s performance accounted for 3% of the total APAC fee pool and commanded a dominant 48.9% share of the Southeast Asian market.
Among individual institutions, DBS Group Holdings captured the top spot in the investment banking fee league table for the first half of 2026. The bank secured US$50.1 million in fees, effectively capturing a 12% share of the nation’s total fee pool.
The revenue mix across the industry showed highly divergent performance by asset class, with advisory fees from completed mergers and acquisitions climbing 8.5% year-on-year to hit a three-year high of US$142.5 million. Underwriting fees from syndicated loans experienced the strongest growth, surging 30.3% year-on-year to US$134.2 million. Conversely, capital markets activity slowed down during the six-month period, as equity capital markets underwriting fees fell by 6.1% to US$85.7 million, and debt capital markets transaction fees faced the steepest decline, falling 30.2% year-on-year to US$56.1 million.
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