Singapore’s Temasek has no interest in crypto for now: CNBC

Temasek Holdings, Singapore’s state investment fund with a portfolio worth $286 billion, has ruled out looking at cryptocurrency-related investments in the near term.

Rohit Sipahimalani, Temasek’s chief investment officer, told CNBC on Tuesday that there’s “a lot of regulatory uncertainty in the crypto space.”

“I do think that [would] be very difficult for us to make another investment and exchange in the middle of all this regulatory uncertainty,” Sipahimalani said.

Sipahimalani added Temasek never intended to make investments in crypto.

“We’ve never been looking to invest in cryptocurrencies. Even the investment in FTX, we’ll be talking about investing in an exchange, which allowed us to get fee-based revenue without thinking [of] balance sheet risk or any trading risks,” Sipahimalani said.

Temasek may consider crypto investments at some point in the future, however. “If you have the right regulatory framework, and we are comfortable with it, and you have the right investment opportunity, there’s no reason for us not to look at it,” Sipahimalani continued.

“But as I said, at this point in time, we would not be comfortable investing in exchanges given the way things are right now.”

Temasek’s FTX losses

Temasek’s sentiment comes after the sovereign wealth fund suffered $275 million in losses following the November collapse of FTX.

In May, Temasek said it had cut the compensation of staff involved with its investment in FTX, saying although there was no misconduct by the investment team in reaching their investment recommendation, the investment team and senior management should be “ultimately responsible for investment decisions made.”