Retail investors, researchers and library users will now find it much easier to research information on listed companies in Singapore, as well as gain access to financial information on Singapore stocks and derivatives.

With the launch of the new Investment Resource and Information Service (IRIS)@National Library, 6 new computer terminals at the Business Collection, Level 8 of the Lee Kong Chian Reference Library (LKCRL) will provide a one-stop destination for investor research.

IRIS is a collaborative effort between the National Library Board (NLB) and Singapore Exchange Ltd (SGX), and was officially launched on 28 November 2006 with the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between NLB and SGX. Representing their respective organisations in the signing were Dr N Varaprasad, Chief Executive, NLB and Mr Hsieh Fu Hua, Chief Executive Officer, SGX. Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports, officiated at the MoU and affirmed that IRIS will “make investing, for the general public, more than just a gamble.”

Forged from the common vision of both NLB and SGX in promoting Singapore as a financial hub, IRIS aims to improve financial literacy amongst the general public so as to help them make educated investment decisions.

It hopes to achieve this by working with cutting edge market data providers such as ShareInvestor, NextView and Standard & Poor’s that will provide free access to real-time stock prices and trading tools such as charts, ratios, and independent research reports.

Of the 6 terminals, 3 provide access to SGX’s Archive Investment Resources. This would cover electronic copies of all listed companies’ Annual Reports, Corporate Announcements, Prospectuses and Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) from 1997 to the present. This in itself is an invaluable source as both a repository of local heritage (business) publications, as well as a convenient one-stop directory of information on listed companies in Singapore. This consolidated database is not available anywhere else in Singapore, and even the SGX website offers company reports that date back to the last 2 years only.

The other 3 terminals consist of 1 dedicated terminal each for ShareInvestor’s “SI Station”, NextView’s “NV Advisor”, as well as Standard & Poor’s. Although LKCRL already has 4 existing Bloomberg terminals that are very popular with our patrons, the new IRIS stations have proven to be a big hit as well with its real-time information and relative ease of use. Some regular users of Bloomberg have even been spotted “defecting” over to these new stock market databases.

In addition, SGX will contribute its physical annual reports and IPOs to supplement the library’s current collection. Future plans also include SGX-NLB investment education programmes on financial literacy to be conducted at NLB libraries.

Both partners are understandably excited about the collaboration. Said SGX’s Mr Hsieh, “NLB’s partnership allows us to reach a broader audience. At the end of the day, it is to engage the man-in-the-street, to promote retail participation in the market.” NLB’s Dr Varaprasad referenced NLB’s Library 2010 Strategic Plan by likening IRIS to “a kind of repositioning for the National Library, as a trusted source of relevant, reliable information and knowledge, provided in a globally connected way, available real-time, and supported by a group of competent library professionals.”

Contributed by Chris Tang, Lee Kong Chian Reference Library, NLB