With the aim of raising the standards of corporate governance for listed companies, full support has been given to new measures, proposed by the Singapore Exchange
(SGX), by the industry players.

However, they are aware that the pre-requisite for ensuring that listing costs do not become onerous is fine tuning.

Saturday saw SGX chief executive Hsieh Fu Hua declaring, that chief financial officers (CFOs) should be appointed along with independent directors at least six months before to an initial public offering (IPO) submission. This will provide them with ample time to perform due appraisal of an IPO candidate.

He further added that for an initial period of two years post-IPO, newly listed companies should appoint 'governance advisers' - most likely corporate lawyers or issue managers, in order to aid firms put in place vigorous frameworks for reporting, accountability and internal control.

Majority supported the planned changes - for which no firm timetable has yet been announced. Many even gave further points of consideration for the SGX.

SGX's spelling out of minimum timeframes was described as a good idea by Mr. Alan Yong, former CFO of Labroy Marine, and now finance director of Beng Kuang Marine.

Yong said: "CFOs should come on board much earlier than the proposed six months, as they have a critical role to play in the drawing up of cash flows and other financials."