8 New SGX ETFs: What Are You Really Buying?

SGX counted 53 ETFs and leveraged products at the end of June 2026, holding S$20.5 billion, of which retail investors held 42%. Adding this month’s eight gives 61 before any other listings or removals. Fifteen of the 53 are China-focused and 14 are Singapore-focused. By building block:

Counts from SGX’s half-year report (June 2026) and the two issuers’ prospectuses. The categories are SGX’s. Order is by building block, not a ranking.

The additions expand developed-market and individual-country access; they add nothing to the China or Singapore ranges.

DWS factsheets, holdings at 30 September 2026. The equal-weight figure is approximate: each of its 500 companies is about 0.2%. Ordered by the figure shown, not a ranking of merit.

TSMC is 54.0% of the full MSCI Taiwan index (MSCI, September 2026). European rules allow qualifying index-tracking funds to use a 20% issuer limit, rising to 35% for one issuer in exceptional market conditions. The fund therefore tracks a capped version, MSCI Taiwan 20/35. The Nikkei 225 weights companies by share price rather than size, which is how chip-testing firm Advantest becomes its largest holding.

Yahoo Finance delayed quotes, Singapore time, 13 October 2026. Quotes on a new line change by the minute; these are a snapshot, not a measurement of a typical day.

The funds inside the iFAST ETFs had already risen sharply before the launch. In the year to 30 June 2026, Korea returned +187.5% and Taiwan +102.3%, both in US dollars. Japan’s Nikkei 225 returned +75.2% in yen; AI & Big Data returned +50.2% in US dollars. These are the prospectus figures, in different currencies, not a like-for-like performance ranking.

Research suggests that theme funds often launch when their subject is attracting attention. A 2023 study in the Review of Financial Studies examined US ETFs from 1993 to 2019. Over their first five years, specialised funds underperformed by about 30% after adjusting for risk.

That finding concerns theme funds such as the AI fund, not whole-country index funds. It is a tendency across hundreds of launches, not a forecast for any one fund. Nothing here predicts where these markets go next.

DWS listed the existing Irish funds directly on SGX. It registered them with MAS as recognised schemes, with Flow Traders Asia providing buy and sell quotes. Moomoo distributed them during the subscription window.

iFAST took a different route: a Singapore fund that holds an overseas fund. Its Singapore company, iFAST Global ETFs Select Series VCC, has four funds, each holding one Xtrackers fund. iFAST charges 0.25% a year for managing them. iFAST Financial and North Point Global provide buy and sell quotes.

The Irish and Luxembourg funds inside are, in the prospectus’s words, “not authorised by MAS and will not be directly offered to the public in Singapore”. You buy shares in the Singapore fund instead.

Why use a partner? The history offers a possible explanation, not a confirmed motive. In August 2020, DWS removed 23 Xtrackers listings from SGX, citing “the current level of the Net Asset Value of the Singapore Shares”. These included MSCI Korea 1C and MSCI Taiwan 1C, the versions of the funds that iFAST now holds.

iFAST supplies the Singapore fund and local distribution; DWS manages the underlying fund. The prospectuses establish those roles, but not how the firms divide every commercial cost. iFAST has described issuing ETFs as a “natural extension” of its role, and says the first funds follow its research views. The firms’ commercial terms are not public; this explanation of their motives is inference.

For the investor, the distinction is the fee layers. The direct DWS listings have one fund’s fees. The iFAST listings have the Singapore fund’s expenses and the overseas fund’s expenses. Neither structure is a US fund, so both sit outside the US estate-tax issue described in the earlier article.

A separate platform fee, for unit trusts. A unit trust is another type of investment fund. The platforms cited here charge 0.30%–0.60% a year on top of the unit trust’s own fund fee, depending on the account and service. This is separate from the iFAST ETF expenses discussed here.

• All eight accumulate: dividends are reinvested, not paid out. None is currency-hedged.
• iFAST lines: offer at S$1.00 a share from 1 October to 12:00 on 14 October 2026; listing 22 October 2026; board lot one share. “Costs” means other fees that the prospectus says may each amount to or exceed 0.10% a year; audited actual expense ratios are not yet available. All four iFAST totals use FSM Global’s published pre-launch figures, treated here as estimates rather than audited actual costs. The combined Singapore running expenses are not stated.
• DWS lines: same ISIN as the London and Frankfurt listings; listing 13 October 2026.

• Five-company share = the sum of the fund’s published weights in Nvidia, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Alphabet (both share classes added), from each fund’s top-ten holdings at 30 September 2026. All five are in the top ten of each of the four US-heavy funds, so the figure is exact for those funds. For the equal-weight fund, which holds about 500 companies at roughly 0.2% each, the figure is five times 0.2%, approximate.
• Biggest company and ten biggest together are the issuer’s published top-ten figures at the same date, summed.
• iFAST costs: the tool and reproduction script use FSM Global’s published TER figures: Japan 0.43% and AI 0.63% (data at 30 September 2026), Korea 0.67% and Taiwan 0.77% (data at 29 September 2026). These pre-launch figures are treated as single-source estimates, not audited actual charges or contractual caps. They are entered as totals; the underlying fund fee is not added again. The source does not provide a component reconciliation, so no rebate or subsidy is assumed.
• Prospectus components: Korea lists 0.25% current Singapore management, other Singapore expenses, and an underlying all-in fee of up to 0.45%. Taiwan lists the same Singapore management fee and an underlying all-in fee of up to 0.65%. Korea’s underlying up-to-0.45% includes up-to-0.25% management and a 0.20% fixed fee. That fixed fee belongs to the underlying fund. The 0.90% Singapore management maximum is not an overall TER cap; we found no overall cap in the prospectus.
• Japan and AI components: the prospectus lists current Singapore management of 0.25%, other Singapore expenses, and underlying all-in fees of up to 0.09% for Japan and up to 0.35% for AI. FSM Global explicitly calls Japan’s TER an estimate; its AI table says “Total Expense Ratio”. As both funds are pre-launch, we treat both figures as estimates, not historical audited ratios. Neither source supplies a component reconciliation.
• Day-one gap = (buy − sell) ÷ midpoint. S$73 is approximately half the 1.46% gap on S$10,000, measured against the quote midpoint, not a separate fee or a fair-value estimate.
• Menu counts: SGX’s categories (Singapore 7 + 7, China 13 + 2, regional and global 16 + 8 = 53), plus eight.
• Every computed figure is reproduced by the script behind this piece.

• SGX market figures, categories and SRS statement: SGX, ETF Market Highlights 1H2026 (July 2026, data June 2026): 53 ETFs and L&I products, S$20.5 billion, retail 42%, “All SGX listed ETFs are SRS-eligible”, the category lists. A public SGX publication, distributed as a PDF.
• Published Japan and AI TER figures: FSM Global’s Japan article and AI & Big Data article, Table 1 in each, data at 30 September 2026: 0.43% and 0.63% respectively. Japan is explicitly described as estimated; AI is labelled TER, but no audited history is available before launch. Both are treated as estimates here. Same publisher and commercial interest as the Korea/Taiwan source; no independent corroboration or component reconciliation.
• Published Korea and Taiwan TER estimates: FSM Global, Korea and Taiwan arrive on SGX, Table 1, data at 29 September 2026: 0.67% and 0.77% a year respectively. This is iFAST’s own platform, a single commercially interested source; the estimates are not independently corroborated. No component breakdown or overall TER cap is given.
• iFAST structure, fees, dates, codes, SRS and CPF: iFAST Global ETFs Select Series VCC, amended prospectus registered 29 September 2026: feeder structure, Class 1C of each underlying, management fee 0.25% (maximum 0.90%), other fees “may each amount to or exceed 0.10%”, underlying all-in fees, listing 22 October 2026, offer S$1.00, “paid for with cash or SRS monies”, “currently not included under the CPF Investment Scheme”, market makers North Point Global and iFAST Financial, SGX clearing fee 0.0325% and access fee 0.0075%, and the underlying funds’ one-year returns to 30 June 2026.
• Fund costs, currency and exchange prices: DWS ETF FAQ, sections on tracking error, trading price and currency exposure, read 13 October 2026. TER alone does not describe every cost affecting fund returns; trading prices also depend on liquidity and market hours.
• DWS lines: the Singapore prospectus registered by MAS on 14 September 2026, as cited in the earlier piece.
• Holdings and fund fees at 30 September 2026: DWS factsheets for the eight Xtrackers classes (S&P 500 4C, Nasdaq 100 1C, MSCI World 1C, S&P 500 Equal Weight 1C, AI & Big Data 1C, Nikkei 225 1C, MSCI Korea 1C, MSCI Taiwan 1C).
• TSMC’s weight in the full index: MSCI Taiwan Leaders 50 Select Index factsheet, parent index column, 54.00%, data to September 2026.
• The 20% and 35% limits: Directive 2009/65/EC (UCITS), Article 53. Nikkei 225 weighting by share price: Nikkei Inc., index profile.
• The 2020 delisting: SGXNet notice of 29 June 2020: 23 share classes delisted with effect from 21 August 2020, including MSCI Korea 1C (LU0292100046) and MSCI Taiwan 1C (LU0292109187).
• CPF: CPF Board, List A of included ETFs (updated 17 September 2025): six funds.
• Dividend tax rates: IRS Tax Treaty Table 1 and Publication 515.
• Platform fees: FSM Global pricing, 0.0875% a quarter on equity funds held with cash or SRS, no sales charge; Endowus pricing, 0.60% a year on cash below S$200,000 and 0.30% on a single fund with SRS.
• Specialised fund launches: Ben-David, Franzoni, Kim and Moussawi, “Competition for Attention in the ETF Space”, Review of Financial Studies 36(3), 2023, 987–1042.
• iFAST’s stated reasons: The Edge Singapore, 1 October 2026, “iFAST and Xtrackers by DWS launch four ETFs on SGX”.
• Day-one quotes: Yahoo Finance delayed quotes for XUS.SI, XND.SI, XWR.SI and EUS.SI at the times shown, 13 October 2026.

• The iFAST fees. All four iFAST funds use published pre-launch TER figures, treated as estimates rather than audited actual costs. We could not reconcile them to the prospectus component tables or verify an overall TER cap. We do not infer rebates, subsidies or a fixed Singapore-layer cost from the published totals.
• The menu count. The illustrative 61 is 53 at June 2026 plus eight. Any listing or delisting between July and October 2026 would change it. We have not verified a complete October count.
• Earlier listings. The 2020 delisting notice and June 2026 list do not establish every listing or removal in between.
• Trading and currency costs: broker terms and live quotes vary. Internal fund costs and market-making friction are not measured here; no all-in route cost or break-even period is projected.
• Day-one quotes are delayed and from one source. First prints can be unrepresentative; they are not used to forecast future trading costs.
• SRS on day one depends on each SRS operator and broker enabling the counters.