After 13 years as Deputy Managing Director for Corporate Development, Jacqueline Loh is stepping out of that role at the Monetary Authority of Singapore and becoming Principal Advisor in the Managing Director’s office. The move, announced on 1 October 2026 and effective 1 November 2026, is the headline change in a broader reshuffle at Singapore’s central bank and financial regulator. Understanding the MAS senior leadership changes in full requires looking at these details closely.
The MAS senior leadership changes were disclosed in an MAS media release and corroborated by multiple outlets. In this article you will find the confirmed facts, what portfolios are moving to whom, and how this slots into the wider regulatory calendar in Singapore — drawn together with context from gf6.com’s four-year curated directory of banks and ATMs worldwide, via gf6.com.
The finding — what MAS announced — MAS senior leadership changes
On 1 October 2026, MAS announced a set of senior management changes all taking effect on 1 November 2026. The reshuffle touches two of its most senior roles and realigns responsibility for prudential policy, anti-money laundering, enforcement and payments supervision. These figures put the MAS senior leadership changes into clearer perspective.
The confirmed moves are as follows:
- Ms Jacqueline Loh — Deputy Managing Director (Corporate Development) for 13 years across multiple portfolios — will relinquish that role and be appointed Principal Advisor in the Managing Director’s office, while retaining her position as Chair of the Board of the Singapore Payments Network (SPaN).
- Ms Gillian Tan — currently Assistant Managing Director (Development & International) — will be appointed Assistant Managing Director (Policy, Payments & Financial Crime), taking over responsibility for prudential policy, anti-money laundering, enforcement, and supervision of payment services providers.
The announcement was carried in the MAS media release and independently reflected on the regulator’s own management team page and in specialist financial trade press, including MAS management team and The Asian Banker.
What it means
Jacqueline Loh’s new title — Principal Advisor in the Managing Director’s office — removes her from a line executive role but keeps her inside the institution’s most senior circle. The decision to retain her as Chair of the Board of SPaN signals continuity on the payments-network side even as the executive portfolio changes hands. In the words of Chia Der Jiun, Managing Director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore: “Jacqueline has made significant and enduring contributions to MAS.” This context matters for anyone following the MAS senior leadership changes.
Gillian Tan’s new remit is unusually broad. Grouping prudential policy, anti-money laundering, enforcement and payments supervision under one Assistant Managing Director puts the regulatory tools that most directly affect banks in Singapore, payment institutions and foreign financial groups operating in the city-state under a single senior owner. That is a structural signal as much as a personnel one.
It is important to be careful here about cause and effect. The reshuffle lands at a moment when MAS is also consulting on tighter corporate governance rules for banks and insurers (consultation P016-2026, open until 9 December 2026). The two tracks will interact in practice, but MAS has not framed the leadership changes as a response to that consultation, and we do not do so either. It is a central thread in the wider MAS senior leadership changes.
For international banks and payment service providers with a Singapore footprint, the practical takeaway is simpler: from 1 November 2026, the senior counterpart on AML, enforcement and payments supervision at MAS will be the same person. That is widely seen as a consolidation of supervisory accountability, though how it plays out in day-to-day engagement will only become clear in the months after the handover. Such details shaped how the MAS senior leadership changes unfolded.
Explore the full data behind this article: bank branches worldwide and ATMs worldwide in the gf6.com directory.
Methodology
The event facts above come from the MAS media release dated 1 October 2026, corroborated by the MAS management team page and reporting in The Asian Banker. All names, titles, portfolios and dates are reproduced as published; nothing has been estimated or inferred.
Background on Singapore’s banking footprint referenced in this piece is drawn from gf6.com’s own worldwide directory of bank branches and ATMs — a curated database of roughly 445,000 financial locations (about 346,000 bank branches and 99,000 ATMs) built and expanded over four years from public sources and ongoing manual research. The directory is a large but incomplete sample; coverage varies by country, and it is not an official or government dataset.
Frequently asked questions
When do the MAS senior leadership changes take effect?
MAS announced the changes on 1 October 2026, and they all take effect on 1 November 2026.
What is Jacqueline Loh's new role at MAS?
She relinquishes her position as Deputy Managing Director (Corporate Development), which she held for 13 years across multiple portfolios, and becomes Principal Advisor in the Managing Director’s office. She remains Chair of the Board of the Singapore Payments Network (SPaN).
What portfolio is Gillian Tan taking over?
She moves from Assistant Managing Director (Development & International) to Assistant Managing Director (Policy, Payments & Financial Crime). The role covers prudential policy, anti-money laundering, enforcement, and supervision of payment services providers.
Is this reshuffle linked to the MAS corporate governance consultation?
MAS is currently consulting on tighter corporate governance rules for banks and insurers under consultation P016-2026, which is open until 9 December 2026. MAS has not stated that the leadership changes are a response to that consultation, and we do not claim a direct link.
Does this change which banks are regulated in Singapore?
No. The reshuffle changes who at MAS is responsible for certain portfolios; it does not alter the perimeter of regulation. Banks, insurers and payment service providers licensed in Singapore remain supervised by MAS.
Where was this first reported?
In the MAS media release of 1 October 2026, with corroborating information on the MAS management team page and in The Asian Banker. Links to all three are provided above.
This article was produced with AI assistance from publicly available sources and is handled under our editorial standards and AI policy.
I have been online since 1995. For many years, I worked in the e-commerce sector, setting up several online shops, and have always been interested in data analysis. In 2007, I moved to the Seychelles to work from there or as a digital nomad. In recent years, I have increasingly specialised in the financial sector. I manage the Seychelles’ Commercial Register and am also very familiar with the offshore world. GF6.com is a project I have been working on for many years. I built and curated the 445,000-entry bank database myself over a period of six years, and for the past two years or so I have also been using AI to achieve better structures.
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