Investment banking fees in Singapore rose 9% year-on-year to $693.8mn in the first nine months of 2026, the highest total for the period since 2021, The Business Times reports.

The city-state took 69.3% of the fee pool across Southeast Asia over the period, according to the Singapore Investment Banking Review from LSEG Deals Intelligence. Advisory income grew as the value of M&A deals involving Singapore nearly doubled.

Fees from advising on completed mergers and acquisitions grew 23.7% to $256mn, the largest share of the total. Underwriting fees from equity capital markets climbed 11.5% to $159.8mn, and syndicated lending fees increased 11.3% to $175.9mn. Debt capital markets fees fell 24.6% to $102.3mn.

Goldman Sachs led the overall fee rankings with $86.5mn, a market share of 12.5%. DBS came second with $61.1mn, ahead of Morgan Stanley with $55.3mn.

M&A deal value involving Singapore rose 98.2% to $104.3bn. "Activity was driven by a record first quarter, although dealmaking slowed in subsequent quarters," LSEG said. LSEG added that third-quarter volume declined 9.9% month-on-month to $24.1bn.

Outbound M&A reached a record $46.3bn, more than three times the 2025 figure. The jump came mainly from sovereign wealth fund GIC's involvement in the $30bn funding round raised by US artificial intelligence company Anthropic in February.

Acquisitions of Singapore companies grew 88.5% to $39.2bn, a five-year high. Deals included the $5.2bn buyout of data centre operator STT GDC by KKR and Singtel. Technology accounted for 45.8% of total deal value, or $47.7bn. Morgan Stanley ranked first in M&A advisory with deals worth $14.9bn.

Issuers domiciled in Singapore raised $7.4bn in equity capital markets, up 28.2%, although the number of deals fell 44.6% to 31. Ten initial public offerings brought in $3.3bn, led by the $1.7bn Hong Kong listing of Shein Global, which has its headquarters in Singapore. DBS topped equity underwriting with $918.2mn.

Primary bond issuance by Singapore-domiciled entities increased 6.7% to $37bn, the strongest year-to-date figure since LSEG records began in 1980. Financial institutions made up two-thirds of the total, with large offerings from DBS, OCBC and UOB. OCBC ranked first as bookrunner, underwriting $4.1bn in proceeds.