Portfolio Update Q3 2023

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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 not pivot in 2023, and in addition, there may not be any FED pivot even in 2024.  Based on the dot plot, the FED members are quite undecided on what the interest rates are going to be by end of 2024, and announced that they will act on the statistics and data in future.  Probably, the high interest rates is going to stay for longer periods, even till the end of 2024 especially when there are signs of inflation resurfacing.  This is just getting more sticky especially when the oil prices are now soaring towards USD 100.  This is made worse as we are going to approach winter months in the northern hemisphere and the demand for oil could spike further.

For this month, it has not been kind to my portfolio.  The hawkish FED is dampening the REITs, big Tech, and even the banks are not spared.  Basically, the longer than expected high interest rate environment, and the resilient US job markets is going to encourage the high interest rate level till something, somewhere, breaks.  I should probably just continue to work, DCA, and continue to remain invested in the markets and pay less attention to the performance of my portfolio, regardless of how red it is going to get in the coming days or months before recovery.  Volatility is here to stay for now.  Despite this, I will need to pay attention to the financial health of the companies in my portfolio.  In the past quarter, the problems faced by Manulife US REIT and EC World REIT, which caused them to stop paying dividends and suspended the trading of their shares respectively, may be the start of a more worrying storm to come.  It is prudent to err on the side of caution.

On a happier note, despite the fluctuations in portfolio value, dividends collected in the third quarter has been satisfactory, at SGD 7,054.61 from quarterly dividends from Mapletree Family REITs, Singapore Technologies Engineering and semi-annual dividends from Overseas-Banking Corporation, Hong Leong Finance, Capitaland Integrated Commercial Trust and ParkwayLife REIT.  The positivity is that this amount is about 21% higher than the amount of dividends collected in the third quarter of 2022.  Accumulatively, the total dividends collected in the first 3 quarters of 2023 is approximately 27% higher than that in first 3 quarters of 2022.  These numbers signal that I am progressing in the right direction, and slowly but surely I am another step closer to my Barista FIRE goal.

For this month, the total portfolio market value rose and crashed again, closing off the month lower at approximately SGD 490k in this quarter, including a capital injection of about SGD 2K, which is a decrease of about 2.0%.  The performance is within expectations because historically September is generally of month of under-performance.  However, it remains a good time to slowly scoop some shares during the retreat in share prices.  Nonetheless, I am looking forward to the upcoming quarterly reporting, to continue to collect the dividends from my portfolio in the final quarter of 2023.  Barista FIRE, here I come...!

SG Dividends Portfolio

US Growth Portfolio

Total Portfolio Value: SGD 490,873.74 (USD 1 : SGD 1.3661)

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