Singapore Asset Management Survey 2024: what S$6.07 trillion means for the VCC

The headline: S$6.07 trillion, growth back on

Singapore's total assets under management grew 12% to S$6.07 trillion (about US$4.46 trillion) in 2024, recovering the momentum lost in the 2022 drawdown and setting a fresh high. Growth was driven by both stronger market performance and a sharp pickup in net inflows, which rose roughly 50% over 2023 to around S$290 billion. The survey drew 1,364 respondents across banks, capital markets services licensees, financial advisers, insurers and exempt entities.

Singapore's role as a regional gateway is unchanged: 77% of AUM is sourced from outside Singapore, and 88% of total AUM is invested outside the country. Discretionary mandates remain more than half of total AUM — the signal that decision-makers, not just booking entities, sit here.

The VCC is now the default fund structure

The clearest structural story in the 2024 survey is the Variable Capital Company. By 31 December 2024, 1,200 VCCs had been incorporated or re-domiciled in Singapore, holding 2,695 sub-funds and managed by 628 regulated fund management companies. That is a step-change in a single year:

Sub-funds grew faster than VCCs themselves, which is what you would expect as managers learn to run umbrella structures — adding ring-fenced strategies under one legal entity rather than incorporating a fresh vehicle each time.

What are managers using VCCs for?

The survey breaks VCC usage down by strategy, and it maps closely to where the alternatives money is going:

Private equity and venture capital lead at 40%, with EAMs and multi-family offices a clear second at 22% — the closed-ended and family-capital use cases the VCC was designed for. See the full map of VCC fund types.

Alternatives led the year — and so did private credit

Alternative AUM grew 14% in 2024, ahead of the 12% total. The growth was concentrated, not broad:

Hedge funds and PE/VC more than offset a decline in REIT and real estate AUM as higher financing costs continued to weigh on property. Separately, MAS reports that investments in private credit rose 21% year-on-year — the asset class that has done most to reshape the alternatives mix, and an increasingly common VCC mandate.

The rest of the picture

• Retail funds. Authorised and Recognised Collective Investment Schemes offered in Singapore rose 31% to S$191 billion in aggregate.
• ESG. Monies managed with an ESG overlay made up 48% of total AUM; the number of managers offering ESG strategies held at 284.
• Manager count. The net number of licensed fund management companies rose from 1,250 to 1,298, with continued interest from private equity and hedge fund managers opening offices to tap the region.

What it means for managers in 2025

MAS frames the year ahead around digital transformation, cost optimisation and revenue compression — the operating pressures every manager is feeling — while noting that Asia remains conducive for growth and diversification, particularly into private credit and secondaries. For anyone weighing a structure, the survey makes the practical case on its own: the VCC is no longer the new option to justify, it is the one most of the market has already chosen. The deciding questions are now about tax incentive eligibility, the right manager arrangement, and whether to launch standalone or as an umbrella.