Shock. Dismay. Indignation. If you're an investor, these might have been your emotions when you learnt of the recent announcement by the Chinese government that institutions offering school curriculum tuition would be required to operate on a not-for-profit basis and that foreign investment in the sector would be banned.

Needless to say, global investors in China's red-hot US$100 billion (S$135 billion) private tutoring and online education sector were left reeling by last month's announcement. However, if you're like us, the parents of a Singaporean child, your reaction may have been very different. For us, the announcement suggested that the $1.4 billion Singapore tuition industry could also be changed.