Yeah Lee Ching recalls when a lady walked into her pawnshop in Singapore and pledged a $10,000 diamond-studded gold Rolex watch to bankroll casino spending. She never came back for her jewelry.
Pawnbrokers are proliferating across Singapore as gamblers seeking short-term loans add to demand for quick cash from people struggling to make ends meet in the world’s most expensive city. The number of pawnshops in the city-state surged to 214 this year from 114 in 2008, according to a report by DMG & Partners Securities Pte. Loans disbursed by the industry jumped to S$5.5 billion ($4.4 billion) in 2013 from S$1.6 billion in 2007, government data show.
“Pawnshops are the most-frequent automated teller machines for regular gamblers,” Ivan Ho, president of Singapore Pawnbrokers’ Association, said in an interview this month. “They need capital and pawnshops offer them loans that are reasonably priced.”