~~Towards Barista FIRE~~

This month marks the end of the 3rd quarter of 2023.  Thus it's definitely a good time for me to record the performance of my portfolio to track how it has been. To recap, I started my SG Dividends Portfolio in late 2017, and I began tracking the dividends and all reinvestment done starting 2018.  To date, my SG Dividends Portfolio consist of banks, REITs and defense technology.  On the other hand, I only started the US Growth Portfolio in late December 2021.  Currently, my US Growth Portfolio consist of mainly big tech names, bank and exchange traded funds (ETFs). Being a relatively conservative investor, I prefer to dollar cost average (DCA) into the market to slowly build up my portfolio.  The advantages of using Interactive Brokers to buy the US shares via DCA are undoubtedly the low fees and ability to buy fractional shares of mega-cap technology shares like Alphabet and Tesla.  The latest FED meeting in September further confirmed that the FED will ...

Recently I watched this video on " 29 years old and already $250,000 in debt ".  The video discuss the investing climate in South Korea, especially amongst the younger retail investors aged 20s to 30s.  Based on the video, studies have shown that the investing mentality in the younger Koreans are geared towards 'gambling mindset' instead of investing.   Many of the Koreans in the 20s are 30s are dabbling in cryptocurrencies and penny stocks.  Do not get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with these investment vehicles, but the main problem lies with them investing with leverage, and getting loans to 'invest'.  This is a big red flag in investing.  Borrowing money to invest is very dangerous because equities are volatile, more so for cryptocurrencies and penny stocks.  Although volatility creates opportunities for traders, but it remains as a double edged sword, either you "go big, or go home".  Once the investments do not go in the direction on...

Recently I came across this article by The Simple Sum Singapore on the Seven Deadly Sins of Your Finances , and I felt that this is an interesting perspective to share with everyone.  1)    Pride: Ego Over Money is Your Motto Personally I do not think that I am guilty of this.  I am a self-employed full time private tutor since 2015.  In the past 7 years, there are good times and bad, and the number of students I managed to get varies.  In periods where I am unable to get enough students for myself, I do not hesitate to apply to work part time in tuition centers, where I get to supplement my income by conducting 1 to 2 extra lessons per week.  Income from tuition centers is much lower than the income I can earn from private tutoring (only about half and the rest go to the tuition center), thus personally I think I view money over ego for now, at least before I achieve financial independence. 2)    Greed: More Is Better To You I suppose I am g...

This is probably an apt illustration of my earlier post , comparing cash versus cashflow, and how financial prudency impacts one's abilities to manage their finances. Once upon a time in the vibrant Southeast Asia, there were two cousins named Mala and Singa.  Despite their similar upbringing and close family ties, their financial journeys took remarkably different paths. Mala, the older of the two, had inherited large number of properties, massive acres of land and abundant cash from his ancestors.  This made Mala the envy of many, as his potential for future success and growth seemed limitless, with the abundance of resources that he owned.  It almost seemed like Mala would no longer need to work for a day in his life, as the resources he owned will be able to last him a lifetime.  This, inevitably made Mala a tad too comfortable with his current status and thus less prudent in managing his finances. On the other side, Singa, the younger cousin, started off with v...

Recently, I watched the documentary by Channel News Asia on Singapore Reserves: The Untold Story Part 1 and Part 2 .  As I watched in awe how the Singapore government handle and managed their reserves through 3 different agencies, namely Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), Temasek Holdings and Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC), I noticed that very much like managing personal finances, diversification and asset allocation is also an important aspect.  In summary, Temasek deals with shorter term and riskier investments like equities in various industries, GIC deals with longer term, safer investments like overseas blue chips, bonds and real estate, and MAS deals with foreign reserves.  In the foreign reserves, what caught my attention is the vast amount of glittery shiny golden metal that Singapore has in their stockpile. With Singapore being looked upon as a 'A1 student' in managing its reserves, at least in my opinion, it makes me wonder if I should...