Mar 2015 Portfolio

This month, we are at the top of the charts, NASDAQ and Dow is making new highs almost everyday and Japan Nikki also making new 15 years high as they are out of recession. The market slide abit also because of worries that Fed will raise interest rate too much or too soon. And so Fed said they are not going to raise rate in 2015 as US economy was rather weak. So market reacted positively to this piece of news. This month we also lost our first PM Mr Lee Kuan Yew. I was expecting SG market to react abit to this not so sudden bad news, because PMO kept sending updates on LKY's health, everyone kinda prepared for the bad news.

Up and down, up and down as usual.

This month I added Hotung into my portfolio.
Hotung has been in my watchlist for a long time. It is a long time, diversified investment company with more than 100+ companies in its portfolio paying high dividend of 8.6% with PE 13, below NAV of PB 0.51 only and no debt :) There is a ongoing buy-back annual exercise.

Also added defensive blue chip ST Engineering into my portfolio. Doesn't have impressive PE, PBR but is consistently giving out dividends with very low debt. Cheers, I got another blue chip :)
STI vs my portfolio

This month, I lost to STI mainly due to XD of my Global Inv which is currently my largest holding. I will see a bump up next month when they give me my dividend scrips. Second Chance sees 36% fall in 2H net profit to $4.2 million and dragged down my portfolio abit. Overall STI is flaring much better than last month. Maybe better luck next month :)

Period	STI	My Portfolio (Realised)	Verdict
Jan 2015	2.71%	3.21%	I win
Feb 2015	2.41%	2.16%	I lose
Mar 2015	3.31%	0.62%	I lose

Total 13 stocks in portfolio

Dividend
This month I pocketed a little dividend from Lippo Mall Tr and Asian Pay TV Tr
Checkout my Dividend history

Singapore's Greatest Loss! : Mr Lee Kuan Yew

Today, all of the government buildings and schools have their Singapore flag lowered at half mast as we, Singaporeans, mourn for our founding father, Mr Lee Kuan Yew.

I still remember when I was a school boy in the 80s, my impression of you was that you were a tough, no nonsense PM who will bulldozed anyone who was in your way. Some of the tough action from you was the sacking of the Singapore PR SIA pilot who lead the strike in SIA. You just sack that fellow off and banished him back to where he came from, Malaysia.

Your vision of Singapore all came true!
“this was a mud-flat, swamp. Today, this is a modern city. Ten years from now, this will be a metropolis. Never fear.”

The Marina Barrage is also the result of your vision nearly two decades ago when you envisaged damming the mouth of the Marina Channel to create a freshwater reservoir.

Without you, there will be no Singapore.

Thanks for preparing us to face the tough world, we will survive and prosper!

Thank you

Kid's Money Management Gone Wrong

This isn't actually happening in my family but its a true story that I witnessed which I am going to share with you.

Its one of the weekend which my family and I will go to market to have our usual brunch (breakfast + lunch). There's this mother and 2 kids (about one 8 years old boy and other a 5 years old gal) with a packet of soya bean drink walking just infront of us.

The boy was saying 'Mummy why you ask me to give mei mei (younger sister) drink my soya drink?'

'Cannot the drink is mine' the boy said.

Apparently the little girl ignored her elder brother's plea and just innocently drink the beverage.

The boy was clearly upset and demanded 'Mummy, mei mei drink my soya bean, I dont care she must pay me the drink'

The mummy was getting a bit annoyed and said 'Why cant you just let your sister drink a bit'

The boy answered 'No! cannot! I buy using my own money leh.. I dont care mei mei must return my money'. The boy was very insistence and kept on demanding to have his money back.

The mother became very angry and shouted 'You want your money back?! ok!' and she threw the coins on the ground and fumed off. The boy then went to pick up the coins by himself.

Seems like the kid's education on value of money had gone wrong. Its good that we let our kids manage their money at an early age by giving them a fixed amount of money daily or monthly and they manage their own expenses. But this is something his parents definitely doesn't want to see.

One of my friend's style is to give his primary school daughter $2 per day and at the end of the day, ask her how much is the remaining balance and what was her expenditure. Wow :)

Currently I give my kids daily allowance but there's a piggy bank which I told them if they do not have enough money, they can just go there and help themselves, buffet style :) I don't really monitor their expenses :P So far they have been sensible gals :)

We want our kids to value money and not to be a spendthrift. At the same time, we also don't want them to grow up as a selfish miser. So how do we strike a balance?

Health Is Wealth 健康就是财富

Today is the last day(元宵节) of Chinese New Year (CNY), I hoped you have an enjoyable CNY with your family and friends. I certainly did. So would like to write abit about this CNY.

During CNY, Year of the Goat, was tossing yu sheng 'lo hei yu sheng' with my relative and friends. This dish is very popular during CNY. It is a very simple dish which made up of shredded raw fish and vegetable. We usually stand around it with our chopstick to toss the auspicious dish and at the same time shout out our CNY greetings and wishing everyone a Happy New Year.

These are the common greetings:
恭喜发财 “Gong Xi Fa Cai” meaning “Congratulations for your wealth”
万事如意 “Wan shi ru yi” meaning “May all your wishes be fulfilled”.
年年有馀 "Nian nian you yu" symbolising abundance or excess through the year, is added.

Then someone shouted
健康就是财富 "jian kang jiu shi cai fu" meaning Health Is Wealth

This phrase suddenly brightened me up. Indeed its true, no health no wealth. If we do not have good health, we chalk up high medical expenses, cannot work or invest to bring in more wealth.

Without health, we also cannot enjoy our fruits of labour when we grow old or retire.

Without health, you cannot live through the years to reinvest for the magic of compounding interest rate to work.

Last year when I started my financial freedom journey I also started my fitness journey at almost the same time. I am now running once per week usually during weekends. I know its not alot but its good start and hopefully I can exercise more and run longer distance in the future :)

Some of us use 'expense manager' apps to keep track of our expenses so much so that we can study our expenses and decide which one to cut or reduce. I also used a diet apps to keep track of the calories of the food I eat so that I do not exceed my daily intake of 1500 limit. Now I am going to miss my favourite mutton bryani very much as it can easily hit my daily limit with just 1 meal of it. Eating now is never the same as before :(

I know some of you may have started taking charge of your wealth but have you started taking charge of your health?

I hope I can influence some of you to start your exercise or diet regime too, if you have not done so.