TR EMERITUS

Hoon Thing Leong with his "bestseller" (ST Photo) ST featured a story about a school dropout, Hoon Thing Leong, last week ("Coffee boy is now 'coffee shop king'", 28 Jul). It talked about Mr Hoon launching his book on business failures and successes in June and apparently, the book has "become a bestseller". It was Mr Hoon's first book and ST reported that all 10,000 copies were snapped up within five days. The book in Chinese, "The Boss Strikes - Effective Business Practices", made him a best-selling author overnight, thanks to support from an informal network of mainly Chinese-educated businessmen and friends that he had founded 18 years ago. "I am surprised that so many wanted to read my book," he said. Mr Hoon is the boss behind the coffee shop chain, Kim San Leng. In his book, he revealed his past successes and failures. Mr Hoon was born in Fuzhou, China, and moved to Singapore with his mother when he was five to join his father. He started working as a coffee boy in his father's shop in Hougang when he was 12. He later dropped out of school when he was Secondary 2. By the time he was 24, he started his first coffee shop in Bukit Timah with his younger brother. In 1990, he made news when he paid a record $3.52 million for a coffee shop in Bishan Street 13. He still owns the shop, which is worth many times more today. He is said to devote his entire life to the coffee shop business. In 1996, he and a few other businessmen started an informal business group called, The Bosses Network. The purpose is to organise talks and forums and learn from one another. Mr Hoon said the group currently organises talks almost every other week, where some few hundred people would attend. They would invite professionals from different fields to speak. They even partnered Shin Min Daily News in starting an annual three-day cruise event. Up to 700 members join the cruise each year, where talks and workshops are organised for them. Four years ago, it also started hosting its regular "round table" lunch meetings with government officials and ministers. At each meeting, some 20 of its members would meet the authorities to discuss issues. Senior Minister of State for Finance and Transport and Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC MP, Josephine Teo, who met the group at the Shangri-La Hotel in June, said, "I like the informal setting because I can also be frank with them with my answers to the problems they raise." Mr Hoon Thing Leong is a PAP member Last year, TRE published a piece of news that “grassroots members” were found to be reserving seats for MP at a food court in Block 511 of Bishan for almost 2 hours and were seen “chasing away” food court patrons from the reserved tables (‘Grassroots members chase away foot court patrons to ‘chope’ seats for MP‘). The food court turns out to be part of Mr Hoon's Kim San Leng coffee shop chain. A TRE reader asked, “If this MP goes to a restaurant, is he going to chase away all the customers?!?? If this MP goes to shopping centre, is he going to chase all the people away from shopping centre?” After the news was published, the vice chairman of the Bishan East Citizens Consultative Committee (CCC), Roland Ang, wrote to Stomp to explain that it was the coffee shop owner who reserved the tables and not any grassroots leaders (‘Bishan East CCC: Seats were ‘choped’ by coffeeshop owner, not us‘). Mr Ang said the owner just wanted to be a hospitable host to the group of grassroots leaders and MP on a walkabout. Mr Ang added the owner was informed that the visit would end at his coffee shop. He explained that unbeknown to his group, the coffee shop owner went ahead to reserve the tables. Mr Ang said, “We thank the owner for being hospitable but reservation of tables was not necessary or asked for. We apologise for any inconvenience caused to other patrons.” Later, new information was sent to TRE, confirming that the coffee shop owner, Mr Hoon Thing Leong, is himself a PAP grassroots member ('New revelation: Bishan coffeeshop owner is a PAP member'). The informant told TRE, "It’s no secret the chairman of Kim San Leng group, Hoon Thing Leong, has close relationship with PAP’s grassroots. He is an active grassroots leader (former CCC chairman or something) in Bishan. No wonder the coffee shop was so eager to please the MP lah. They are all own kakis lah." Checks on the Net reveal that in fact, Mr Hoon is a long-time PAP member. At the 2011 PAP Awards, he was awarded the PAP Long Service Medal (Silver). He was also identified as a grassroots member of Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC (Bishan East). http://maintmp.pap.org.sg/uploads/ap/987/documents/pap_awards_2011_recipients_list.pdf Citation: The PAP has remained successful and cohesive all these years because of its loyal and long-serving members who have stayed the course through thick and thin. They did not melt away in crisis. Instead, they rallied to the cause. They did not flinch from the unglamorous work of tilling the ground between elections. Instead, they made significant contributions that have allowed the PAP to win at every General Election. In awarding the Long Service Medals, the Party salutes each of them for their dedication, loyalty and hard work. Mr Hoon’s other achievements found on the Net: He received his PBM in 1999 for his contributions as a grassroots member in Bishan East CCC. He was listed as the Auditor for Bishan East CCC [Link]. Life Honorary President of the Singapore Food Manufacturers’ Association (SFMA) [Link] Vice President of the Federation of Merchants’ Association, Singapore (FMAS) [Link] And interestingly, he appears to be close to Singapore’s President Tony Tan too. In a Zaobao article [Link], it was reported that Mr Hoon organized a “rah-rah” team of more than 20 supporters to follow and support Tony Tan during the Presidential Election in 2011, starting from nomination day till the end of the election: 属下有1000多名会员的老板联谊会的创办人洪鼎良（金山岭美食）说，他们其中20多人就组成了支持陈庆炎的团队，从提名日开始就一路支持他，因为大家认为陈庆炎有世界的眼光，可以把新加坡带到世界的平台上。  Read More →

I refer to the article “Customers annoyed over more ATMs dispensing only $50 notes” (Straits Times, Jul 30). Cannot tell you how many “No $10″ ATMs? It states that “But Singapore’s biggest bank, DBS Bank, which also operates POSB and its ATMs, declined to give the number or proportion of its ATMs issuing only larger bills.” I was rather intrigued by the above “decline to give the number”. So, I looked for clues in the article. 2 of the banks have 12 “No $10″ ATMs? Since “Checks with the three local banks indicate that OCBC is the only bank which still issues $10 bills at all its roughly 600 ATMs. Fewer than 2 per cent of United Overseas Bank’s (UOB) more than 600 ATMs do not issue $10 notes. - Does it mean that only about 12 ATMs (2% of UOB’s 600) out of OCBC and UOB’s total of about 1,200 ATMs – do not issue $10 notes? 97% of “No $10″ ATMs belong to 1 bank? As to “Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam, also Finance Minister and minister in charge of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), replied that 85 per cent of the roughly 2,700 ATMs here dispense $10 notes” - Does it mean that about 405 ATMs (15% of 2,700) do not issue $10 notes? Deducting UOB’s about 12 ATMs – Does it mean that about 393 (405 minus 12) ATMs belong to DBS? If so, then does it mean that about 97% (393 divide by 405) of all the ATMs that do not issue $10 notes, belong to DBS? The “People’s Bank”? I find it sad that what was affectionately known as “the people’s bank”, our national savings bank – which as market watchers said at the time – was transferred to Temasek/DBS at a very low price without any substantive debate in Parliament – continues arguably, with scant regard and consideration to the fact that there are many poor and low-income people in Singapore. For example, there are more than 200,000 who earn less than $1,000 a month, and about 400,000 who earn less than $1,200. Why always cannot tell you? Finally, with regard to “A spokesman for DBS, which has more than 1,100 ATMs, said some ATMs configured to dispense only $50 notes have been changed to dispense $10 and $50 notes. “For ATMs that dispense only $50 notes, we noticed that while the number of withdrawals has decreased, the overall cash withdrawn has remained at a consistent level,” she said. “This indicates that customers may be making fewer trips to withdraw the amount they require.” - Can we be told how many ATMs exactly have been changed to dispense $10 notes too? And by the way, the decrease in the number of withdrawals may simply mean that people have gone to ATM’s that issue $10 notes.   Leong Sze Hian Leong is the Past President of the Society of Financial Service Professionals, an alumnus of Harvard University, has authored 4 books, quoted over 1500 times in the media , has been host of a money radio show, a daily newspaper column, Wharton Fellow, SEACeM Fellow, columnist for Malaysiakini, executive producer of the movie Ilo Ilo (26 international awards). He has served as Honorary Consul of Jamaica and founding advisor to the Financial Planning Associations of Brunei and Indonesia. He has 3 Masters, 2 Bachelors and 13 professional qualifications. He blogs at www.leongszehian.com  Read More →

(30 July) - Singapore Airlines (SIA) said Wednesday its financial first quarter net profit plunged 71.4 percent from the previous year, weighed down by lower passenger and cargo revenue. Net profit in the three months to June came in at Sg$34.8 million ($27.8 million), down from Sg$121.8 million in the same period last year, the national flag-carrier said in a statement. Group revenue fell 4.1 percent to Sg$3.68 billion. "Passenger revenue declined year-on-year on the back of weaker yields amid intense competition, and unforeseen events that depressed travel demand in some key Asian markets," it said. The airline said revenue from its freight arm SIA Cargo also fell "as the airfreight market continued to be affected by excess capacity".   Read more:   https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/singapore-airlines-q1-net-profit-103845543.html    Read More →