Retail investors bet on AI chips as electronics exports near double

The broader economy has remained firm, with the official growth forecast kept at 2% to 4% this year after GDP expanded 6% in the first quarter, exceeding an earlier estimate of 5.8%.

Economists in the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s June survey trimmed their 2026 growth projection to 3.5% from 3.6%. Nomura, however, expects the economy to grow 4.6%, after overall NODX rose 38.4% in May.

“The sector had a remarkable run, and that held even against a backdrop of tariff noise and geopolitical uncertainty,” said Zavier Wong, eToro market analyst.

“With SpaceX freshly listed and OpenAI and Anthropic both signalling public debuts later this year, there is a visible pipeline coming to market that will continue to attract investor attention,” Wong added.

Meanwhile, more than half, or 58%, of respondents kept their portfolios steady in the second quarter, whilst 36% increased their allocations despite global market volatility. Only 6% reduced exposure.

Geopolitical risks remained the top external concern, although worries eased from the previous quarter. About 26% cited international conflict as the biggest external risk to their investments, down from 34% in the first quarter.

International conflict is now nearly level with other major risks, with 25% citing the state of the global economy and 24% pointing to inflation as their biggest external concern.

Only 35% were confident in the global economy.

“Investors have moved past the initial shock of geopolitical disruption and are now repositioning around the opportunities emerging in its wake,” Wong said.

The survey was conducted by Opinium from 14 to 29 May, covering 11,000 retail investors across 13 countries, including 1,000 respondents in Singapore.