RT 
Sembcorp Industries profit warning Sembcorp Industries (SCI) issued a rare profit warning after the market closes on 6 February. The company highlighted that it will be making a material impairment of S$245m in its upcoming 4Q19 results to be announced on 21 February. These impairments are associated with the company’s energy assets. Consequently, the company … Read more
A quick introduction Manulife US REIT has seen strong appreciation in its share price post the counter inclusion in the FTSE EPRA Nareit Index on 23 December 2019. Likely due to institutional funds “front-running” the inclusion (perfectly legal way), the counter appreciated c.10% from 1 October 2019 to the date of inclusion and continued rallying … Read more
Dollar-cost vs. Lump-sum Dollar-cost averaging is the strategy of breaking down a large sum of money and periodically deploying these smaller chunks of funds into investable assets such as stocks/bonds etc. It forms the backbone of a regular savings plan, which is a consistent and disciplined way to invest. By automating a regular savings plan, … Read more
Philip Morris: A SIN stock aiming to do good To some, Philip Morris is considered a “SIN” stock that they will not engage with a 10-foot pole. Well, this is a cigarette stock that aims to achieve a “smoke-free future”, according to the company’s CEO, Andre Calantzpoulos. You may be surprised to hear that from … Read more
Straco had just been hit by the perfect storm that will almost certainly impact its upcoming 4Q19 results as well as 1Q20 results. Flyer suspension The bad news started streaming in back in late-Nov 2019 when a spokesperson for the Singapore Flyer said in a media statement on 26 Nov 2019 that the Singapore Flyer … Read more
I recently came across an interesting article. This was a Harvard Business Review (HBR) article back in Sep 2019 which identified the Top 20 global companies that have achieved the highest-impact business transformations over the past decade. These are the world’s most transformative companies that excelled in the development of new products, services, and business … Read more
Sequence of Returns Risk could be your major party pooper Imagine a hard-working individual name John who started saving and investing early and amassed a nest egg of $1m in his stock portfolio at the age of 65. He proudly produces his bank book, showcasing the magic retirement “figure” clearly imprinted on it to his … Read more
Supplementary Retirement Scheme (SRS) Plenty has been written on the Supplementary Retirement Scheme (or SRS for short). This is a voluntary scheme that complements one’s CPF savings for retirement. You can contribute any amount to your SRS account, subject to a cap of S$15,300 for Singaporeans and $35,700 for foreigners, as many times as you … Read more
I came across this pretty interesting diagram from visualcapitalist aptly called The Periodic Table of Commodity Returns. Its a really fancy table with a myriad of colours that caught my attention. The table basically depicts the annual returns of the key commodities over the past decade. I was interested to find out which was the … Read more
Most of you would have heard of dividend growth investing, buying companies with a good track of growing their dividends. This is a solid way to grow your income over time. However, buying a dividend-growth company can turn out to be a “bad investment” if one grossly overpay for it. So how does one determine … Read more
I follow this website called TipRanks from time to time when I am running dry of stock ideas. TipRanks is a fintech website that tracks and measures the performance of the stock rating issues by over 6,000 Wall Street Analysts. According to their records, the 25 best performing analysts had a success rate of 67.6%, … Read more
Can we enjoy our Latte and still retire well? If you are like millions of people around the world who spend a $5-6/day, 5 days a week, on a nice cup of latte, is that an act of financial irresponsibility that could potentially derail your retirement plans? Well, depends on who you ask that question. … Read more
Not much has been written about Inflation. However, it is one of the Four Key unknowns that affect one’s retirement plan. Granted that inflationary pressure has been low in the past decade. However, having a complacent mindset with a low inflation assumption baked into one’s retirement calculation might be a recipe for disaster. Compound Interest … Read more
NET WORTH UPDATES – Dec 2019 Net worth updates December 2019 – $1.233m (+1.9%) Hi all. Welcome to New Academy of Finance portfolio and net worth report! Coming to the last month of the year and into the 4th month of my sabbatical, I am still treading this whole new financial journey with a certain … Read more
I have written about Robo-advisors on a number of occasions. The advent of Robo-advisors here in Singapore provides an additional option for Singaporeans to start their investment journey with a low capital requirement (a minimum amount of $1k can usually get you started). I do believe that Robo-advisors are good investment platforms for the typical … Read more
We have written in a previous article why a 60:40 equity to bond portfolio composition (Portfolio 1) isn’t the ideal structure for a retirement portfolio using the 4% withdrawal rule. Instead, we suggest using a portfolio structure that consists of 20% equity, 20% bond, 40% REITs and 20% Gold (Portfolio 2). In this article, we … Read more
