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30 Dec 1999

Formal Consolidation | 1999 RevEd

Banking secrecy

47.—(1) Nothing in this Act shall authorise the Authority to inquire specifically into the affairs of any customer of any bank other than to inquire into any credit facilities granted to the customer by a bank.

[6/83; 2/84; 28/93]

(2) Where pursuant to an inquiry relating to credit facilities under subsection (1) or an inspection under section 43 or an investigation under section 44 or to the carrying out of the Authority’s function of supervising the financial condition of any bank incidental information relating to the affairs of a customer is obtained by the Authority that information shall be secret as between the Authority and the bank concerned.

[28/93]

(3) Subject to subsection (4), no official of any bank and no person who by reason of his capacity or office has by any means access to the records of the bank, registers or any correspondence or material with regard to the account of any customer of that bank shall, while his employment in or professional relationship with the bank, as the case may be, continues or after the termination thereof, give, divulge or reveal any information whatsoever regarding the money or other relevant particulars of the account of that customer.

[28/93]

(4) Subsection (3) shall not apply in any case where —

(a)

the customer or his personal representatives gives or give his or their written permission to do so;

(b)

the customer is declared bankrupt in Singapore or Malaysia or if the customer is a company, the company is being wound up;

(c)

the disclosure of the information is with a view to the institution of, or for the purposes of, civil proceedings —

(i)	between the bank and the customer or his guarantor relating to the customer’s banking transaction; or
(ii)	between the bank and 2 or more parties making adverse claims to money in a customer’s account where the bank seeks relief by way of interpleader;

(d)

the officials of any bank by compulsion of any written law in force in Singapore are required to give information to the police or a public officer who is duly authorised under that law to obtain that information or to a court in the investigation or prosecution of a criminal offence under any such law;

(e)

the bank has been served with a garnishee order attaching moneys in the account of the customer;

(f)

the information relates to —

(i)	credit facilities granted by a branch in Singapore of a bank incorporated outside Singapore; or
(ii)	foreign exchange, money market or any other transactions between a branch in Singapore of a bank incorporated outside Singapore and other banks, whether in or outside Singapore, or such other financial institutions as may be determined by the Authority from time to time,

and the information is required by the head office of the branch;

(g)

the information is required to assess the credit-worthiness of a customer in connection with or relating to a bona fide commercial transaction or a prospective commercial transaction so long as the information required is of a general nature and in no way related to the details of a customer’s account;

(h)

the customer died, whether testate or intestate, and the information is required by his appointed personal representative or any person entitled to letters of administration solely in connection with an application for a grant of probate or letters of administration;

(i)

the information relates solely to credit facilities granted by a branch of a bank incorporated outside Singapore and is required by the supervisory authority which is responsible for regulating the head office of the bank for the sole purpose of supervision of the bank by the supervisory authority and where the supervisory authority will not divulge the information received to third parties unless compelled to do so by its domestic law or courts;

(j)

a customer who had been issued with a credit or charge card by a bank has his card suspended or cancelled by the bank by reason of his default in payment and the bank discloses information relating to the customer’s name and identity, the amount of his indebtedness and the date of suspension or cancellation of his credit or charge card to other banks and financial institutions issuing credit or charge cards in Singapore;

(k)

the information relates solely to credit facilities granted by a bank incorporated in Singapore and the information is required by another bank incorporated in Singapore which holds more than half the issued and paid-up capital of the first-mentioned bank; or

(l)

in accordance with such conditions as the Authority may determine, information of such class or classes as the Authority may, from time to time, approve is transmitted from a branch in Singapore of a bank incorporated outside Singapore to its head office or another branch of that bank outside Singapore, solely for the purposes of carrying out collation, synthesis or processing of the information by the head office or that other branch for the branch in Singapore.

[28/93; 21/96; 27/98]

(5) In any civil proceedings under subsection (4)(b) and (c) where information is likely to be disclosed in relation to a customer’s bank account, those proceedings may, if the court, of its own motion or on the application of a party to the proceedings, so orders, be held in camera and the information shall be secret as between the court and the parties thereto.

(6) A bank or financial institution, or any of its officers or employees, receiving any information under subsection (4)(j) shall not disclose such information to any other person.

[28/93]

(7) No person shall publish the name, address or photograph of any parties to those civil proceedings as are referred to in subsection (5) or any information likely to lead to the identification of the parties thereto either during the currency of the proceedings or after they have been terminated.

(8) The Authority may provide information on the operations of a branch in Singapore of a bank incorporated outside Singapore (including any report produced by the Authority pursuant to any inspection or investigation of the bank) to the supervisory authority which is responsible for regulating the head office of the bank for the purpose of supervision of the bank by the supervisory authority, except that no information regarding the money or other relevant particulars, other than credit facilities granted, of the accounts of a customer of the branch in Singapore shall be divulged by the Authority.

[28/93; 27/98]

(9) The Authority may provide information to a supervisory authority under subsection (8) if and only if the supervisory authority is prohibited by its domestic law from divulging the information received to third parties or gives such written undertaking, as to the confidentiality of the information provided, as the Authority may determine.

[27/98]

(10) Nothing in this section shall be deemed to limit any powers conferred upon the Supreme Court or a Judge thereof by Part IV of the Evidence Act (Cap. 97) or to prohibit obedience to an order under that Part.

(11) Any person who contravenes this section shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $50,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 years or to both.

(12) In this section —

“official of any bank” includes a director and an employee of a bank;

“professional relationship” includes a relationship between a bank and a computer bureau, being a relationship that has been approved by the Authority, and such other relationship with a bank as the Authority may from time to time decide;

“written law” means Part IV of the Evidence Act (Cap. 97), the Criminal Procedure Code (Cap. 68), the Goods and Services Tax Act (Cap. 117A), the Internal Security Act (Cap. 143), the Income Tax Act (Cap. 134), the Prevention of Corruption Act (Cap. 241), the Kidnapping Act (Cap. 151) and the Companies Act (Cap. 50).

[21/96]

Informal Consolidation | Amended Act 23 of 2001

Banking secrecy

47.—(1) Customer information shall not, in any way, be disclosed by a bank in Singapore or any of its officers to any other person except as expressly provided in this Act.

(2) A bank in Singapore or any of its officers may, for such purpose as may be specified in the first column of the Sixth Schedule, disclose customer information to such persons or class of persons as may be specified in the second column of that Schedule, and in compliance with such conditions as may be specified in the third column of that Schedule.

(3) Where customer information is likely to be disclosed in any proceedings referred to in item 3 or 4 of Part I of the Sixth Schedule, the court may, either of its own motion, or on the application of any party to the proceedings or the customer to which the customer information relates —

(a)	direct that the proceedings be held in camera; and
(b)	make such further orders as it may consider necessary to ensure the confidentiality of the customer information.

(4) Where an order has been made by a court under subsection (3), any person who, contrary to such an order, publishes any information that is likely to lead to the identification of any party to the proceedings shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $125,000.

(5) Any person (including, where the person is a body corporate, an officer of the body corporate) who receives customer information referred to in Part II of the Sixth Schedule shall not, at any time, disclose the customer information or any part thereof to any other person, except as authorised under that Schedule or if required to do so by an order of court.

(6) Any person who contravenes subsection (1) or (5) shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction —

(a)	in the case of an individual, to a fine not exceeding $125,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 years or to both; or
(b)	in any other case, to a fine not exceeding $250,000.

(7) In this section and in the Sixth Schedule, unless the context otherwise requires —

(a)	where disclosure of customer information is authorised under the Sixth Schedule to be made to any person which is a body corporate, customer information may be disclosed to such officers of the body corporate as may be necessary for the purpose for which the disclosure is authorised under that Schedule; and
(b)	the obligation of any officer or other person who receives customer information referred to in Part II of the Sixth Schedule shall continue after the termination or cessation of his appointment, employment, engagement or other capacity or office in which he had received customer information.

(8) For the avoidance of doubt, nothing in this section shall be construed to prevent a bank from entering into an express agreement with a customer of that bank for a higher degree of confidentiality than that prescribed in this section and in the Sixth Schedule.

(9) Where, in the course of an inspection under section 43 or an investigation under section 44 or the carrying out of the Authority’s function of supervising the financial condition of any bank, the Authority incidentally obtains customer information and such information is not necessary for the supervision or regulation of the bank by the Authority, then, such information shall be treated as secret by the Authority.

(10) This section and the Sixth Schedule shall apply, with such modifications as may be prescribed by the Authority, to a merchant bank approved as a financial institution under section 28 of the Monetary Authority of Singapore Act (Cap. 186) as if the reference to a bank in this section were a reference to such merchant bank.

[23/2001 wef 18/07/2001]

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