CACS Paper 1 Syllabus Explained (2026): The Six Headings and Their Rules

CACS Paper 1, “Legislations, Regulations & Industry Codes of Practice”, has six syllabus headings on IBF’s page: Overview of Wealth Management, Private Banking Code of Conduct, Client Due Diligence, Client Advisory, Wealth Transfers and Succession Planning, and Ethical Conduct. The paper is 80 computer-based multiple-choice questions in 2.5 hours, with a pass mark of 75%, and IBF states there are no exemptions from it. IBF’s exam rules say that registered candidates can access a PDF copy of the study guide through the IBF Portal; this page does something different. For each heading it names the public rules a candidate can read in the original (the ABS Private Banking Code of Conduct, MAS Notice 626, MAS guidelines and the Singapore Acts), and what you should be able to apply. ProSyllabus is an independent study site. It is not affiliated with IBF, the Private Banking Industry Group, the Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS) or MAS, and nothing here is official. Every exam fact below is from IBF’s own pages, and every rule from the official text of the code, notice, guideline or Act named, read on 25 October 2026.

IBF, CACS Examination Details, read 25 October 2026.

IBF’s examination details page lists the headings but gives no number of questions or weight for each, and the study guide is for registered candidates. The mapping below is ours: for each heading, the official text you can read to check a rule, and the skills we suggest practising. Among the changes to the new CACS exams, available from 6 August 2024, IBF lists an “Increase in application-based questions to test candidates’ understanding and application of concepts” and an increase in Paper 1’s duration from 2 hours to 2.5 hours.

Private banking in Singapore serves accredited investors, so the definition comes first. Section 4A of the Securities and Futures Act 2001 makes an individual an accredited investor where net personal assets “exceed in value $2 million”, or financial assets “(net of any related liabilities) exceed in value $1 million” (deposits, investment products and any other prescribed asset), or “income in the preceding 12 months is not less than $300,000” (each “or its equivalent in a foreign currency”). For the net personal assets limb, section 4A(1A) values the primary residence at its estimated fair market value less any outstanding amounts in respect of any credit facility secured by it, and takes the lower of that figure and $1 million. So “exceed” is strict for the two asset limbs, while the income limb is met at exactly S$300,000.

Being eligible is not the whole story. Under the Securities and Futures (Classes of Investors) Regulations 2018, an eligible individual is an accredited investor in relation to a counterparty for the provisions the regulations call the consent provisions only if he or she “has opted to be treated by the counterparty as an accredited investor”, and the regulations allow opting in with one counterparty but not another.

The ABS Private Banking Code of Conduct (the PB Code) is industry good practice: it says what Covered Entities and Covered Persons “are expected to” do. A Covered Person is an individual “in a client-facing role” providing advisory, banking transactional, brokerage or credit services to accredited investors on behalf of a Covered Entity. Subject to the exemptions in paragraph 2.1.3 (people who were FICS-certified at a set level or had at least 15 years of relevant experience as at 1 September 2011, and wealth planners as at 31 December 2018), paragraph 2.1.1 says the Covered Person “is expected to pass the Client Advisor Competency Standards (“CACS”) before he/she provides any financial/wealth advisory service to AIs”, and paragraph 2.2.1 says a Covered Person who does not pass “should not advise clients”.

Competence is then kept up through CPD. The PB Code expects at least 15 hours of CPD in each calendar year, and hours above the minimum “may not be carried forward to the next calendar year”. IBF’s CACS CPD page adds that a minimum of 8 hours should be in training accredited under the IBF Standards Training Scheme in the Private Banking and Wealth Management segment, Future-Enabled Skills or Critical Core Skills, and a minimum of 4 hours in training related to “Rules & Regulations, Compliance or Ethics”. The Code also sets standards for client confidentiality and complaints handling, and its operational framework covers matters from segregation of duties to controls on over-charging and hold-mail.

MAS Notice 626 is binding on banks. Paragraph 6.3 lists when a bank must perform CDD, starting with when it “establishes business relations with any customer”, and, for a customer who has not otherwise established business relations, when it undertakes “any transaction of a value exceeding S$20,000” (other than the digital token transactions dealt with separately). Where a customer or beneficial owner is a politically exposed person (or a family member or close associate of one), paragraph 8.3 requires at least senior management approval, establishing source of wealth and source of funds by appropriate and reasonable means, and enhanced monitoring; paragraph 8.4 lets a bank take a risk-based approach for domestic and international organisation PEPs and for PEPs who have stepped down, except where business relations or transactions with the bank present a higher risk for money laundering or terrorism financing. Paragraph 14.2 requires a bank to “promptly submit reports on suspicious transactions (including attempted transactions), regardless of the amount of the transaction, to STRO”, and the Notice points to section 57 of the CDSA on tipping-off.

PB Code 6.1 (Know Your Client) adds the private banking expectations on knowing the client, including that accounts are approved by persons other than the Covered Person handling the relationship, and MAS’s guidance on private banking controls notes that, as part of KYC, financial institutions “typically obtain and corroborate” the source of wealth of customers and beneficial owners.

PB Code 6.2 asks Covered Entities to act in clients’ best interests, to take the client’s profile into account when recommending products, and to ensure a reasonable basis for each recommendation. Sections 6.3 and 6.4 cover communication and disclosure: paragraph 6.4.4 lists key terms to disclose, starting with fees, charges and other quantifiable benefits such as rebates, commissions, retrocessions and spreads, and paragraph 6.4.6 says disclosure should be in written form as far as practicable. MAS’s Guidelines on Fair Dealing set five outcomes; the 2024 Guidelines say they “are to be applied across all financial products and services”.

This heading turns on Singapore statute. Under section 7 of the Intestate Succession Act 1967, rule 1 gives a surviving spouse the whole estate where there is “no issue and no parent”; rule 2 gives the spouse one-half where there are issue; and rule 4 gives the spouse one-half and the parent or parents the other half where there are parents but no issue. The Act does not apply to the estates of Muslims. Under the Wills Act 1838, section 6 requires the testator’s signature to be made or acknowledged “in the presence of 2 or more witnesses present at the same time”; section 10 makes a gift to an attesting witness, or to the witness’s wife or husband, void; and section 13 says a will is revoked by the testator’s marriage, with stated exceptions. The Mental Capacity Act 2008 provides for lasting powers of attorney (Part 4) and defines a deputy as a person appointed by the court.

PB Code paragraph 4.1 expects Covered Entities and their staff to conduct business “with utmost integrity and professionalism to serve the best interests of their clients”. Section 5 then covers personal conduct, including not acting on inside information (paragraph 5.1.3), taking reasonable steps to execute client orders on the best available terms and allocating them in line with the Covered Entity’s trade allocation policies and procedures, and managing conflicts of interest and gifts (paragraph 5.2.2: gifts and entertainment should be appropriate, and none “offered to or received from public officials”). MAS’s Guidelines on Fit and Proper Criteria name three criteria: honesty, integrity and reputation; competence and capability; and financial soundness. MAS’s Guidelines on Individual Accountability and Conduct set five outcomes; Outcome 5 is a framework that “promotes and sustains among all employees the desired conduct”.

IBF’s examination details page gives no number of questions for each heading, so treat any per-heading split you see as an estimate. Our own practice mocks use a split of our own, shown below so it is never mistaken for IBF’s.

To practise all six headings under time, the independent CACS Paper 1 practice test has two 80-question mocks and a drill for each heading; our practice questions page works through two of its free questions. Fees, booking and rescheduling are in the CACS Paper 1 alerts and updates page.