Singapore firms come with $5 billion

ISTANBUL

Singapore Turkey Investment Company (ST Invest) is entering the local market with investment projects worth $5 billion, according to a company statement issued yesterday.

After an increase in the credit rating of Turkey by Fitch, the group decided to open an office in Turkey, the managing partner, Ali Ijaz Ahmad, said in the statement.

He pointed out that their goal was to offer Singaporean investors high-yield concept projects, adding that they were interested in developing projects with Turkish real estate developers.

Alp Çiçekdağı, the Turkish partner of ST Invest, said the company aimed to bring the capital that Turkish real estate sector needed and high potential projects together. The projects that they are reviewing are worth $5 billion, and they are interested mostly in urban projects at the level of urban infrastructure and master plans, he said at ST Invest’s Turkey office.

ST Invest, which will start to invest in 2013, plans to compete for investments first in Istanbul and around the city. The company will invest in projects in the private sector and/or private-public partnerships, the partners said.

Mutual visits between Turkish and Singaporean ministers and businessmen in 2012 encouraged Singaporean real estate companies, investors and funds to invest in Turkey.