Harsharan Kaur, director at TSMP Law
Singaporean firm TSMP Law has hired former Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) deputy director Harsharan Kaur as a director to grow its investigations and financial services regulations practice across Asia.
“We hope to go beyond Southeast Asia and look to China, Korea and India, especially in the fintech and digital payments space,” Shen Yi Thio, joint managing partner at TSMP Law, told Asia Business Law Journal.
He also noted that while the firm wanted to handle the Singapore component of any investigation, they could still lead and co-ordinate counsel for investigations across the region and globally, if the client wished.
Before Kaur’s eight-year tenure at MAS, she was an associate director at Drew & Napier for seven years. She brings experience in public sector enforcement and private practice litigation.
She was also involved in some of Singapore’s high-profile investigations including anti-money laundering breaches, capital markets violations and cryptocurrency misconduct. This included the SGD3 billion (USD2.3 billion) money laundering case, the Malaysian state-owned investment fund 1MDB case and the Singapore-based cryptocurrency hedge fund Three Arrows Capital case. In addition, she has regularly advised on actions and issues across the payment services, financial advisory, capital markets and anti-money laundering sectors.
At TSMP Law, Kaur would focus on financial regulatory and other regulatory work, as well as lead on some of the investigative work that the firm was briefed on, said Thio.
“Digital assets are here to stay … [but] the only question is what shape or form the regulatory ecosystem takes,” said Thio.
Having a former regulator in the team gave the firm the ability to provide accurate, but more importantly, actionable advice, he added. He also noted that Kaur was in a unique position to assist clients in navigating the challenges of staying innovative while maintaining legal compliance.
