Why investors still have good reasons to back a shopped-out Singapore

Singapore is Asia's REIT capital, which means there's no dearth of well-managed investment vehicles

Singaporeans aren’t spending like they used to, at least not in shopping malls. There are too many already and more are being built. But investors still have good reasons to back mall owners.
 

The city-state has 6.1 million square meters of retail space, of which 8.7 per cent is vacant. Yet companies are forecast to add a further 364,000 square meters, with the biggest chunk hitting the market this year. This is when online shopping is catching on, retailers such as Crabtree and Evelyn are closing physical stores, and rents are scraping the bottom.
 

Two years ago, the median tenant