Month: March 2021

When exactly is the best time to invest?

On By RistrettzIn Personal Finance Series, Wealth & HealthLeave a comment

At last, the million dollar question – When is the best time to really invest. I really doubt anyone can really answer that question. To take on a serious note, the below points in my own opinion matters to when exactly is the best time to invest.

There is no best time

a. It depends on which part of your life you are at.

b. It depends a lot on how ready you are to commit. It takes a tad effort to do so when you want to invest.

c. Mental plays a big part. I don’t know or I’m not sure doesn’t cut it in my opinion. Everyone need to start somewhere. Today’s world is extremely informative so there isn’t really an excuse other than being lazy. (To a certain extent, it means that you have to take that effort to understand and learn)

d. It is never too early or too late. (Investing $10 you have today let you kick start your journey. If you don’t start, you probably won’t as well)

e. Everyone’s horizon and comfort is different. You have to stay disciplined and well-informed at the same time.

f. Never say never. Things changes and things happen – your chance will come but waiting is sometimes your worst enemy so comfort might be the best choice of word here.

Now, this isn’t a clickbait topic but recently I heard about being people rushing in to get their monies to invest in certain asset classes. While I am a big fan of new ventures and new exploration in investments, you kind of need to be in the know in order to assess the risk if a certain investment is worth it.  A recent trend about FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) is getting a little out of hand. I think in investing you need a clear mind. If you know what you are getting into, heaving FOMO is actually okay. At least it calls you to action. Most people just wait for things to happen which is rather meh.

There are many alternative asset classes available today. This is quite amazing as the banks used to hold the “Traditional” Asset classes such as Bonds, Forex, Equities, Structures, Options, hedge funds and private equity. Some of these access are only available to the rich.

Today, there are a huge variety of investing asset classes such as fine whiskey, fine wine, NFTs (Non Fungible Tokens), cryptocurrency, trading cards, Pokémon cards and many more. Money (Also known as Fiat Currency) are going through a digitisation process. No one ones what the future holds but for now, the adoption is still relatively low so my take is that there are still legs for growth.

The point of this article is to really remind ourselves what is a comfortable price valuation for anything that we do or purchase. Once that is being decided, then we have to move on and not harp over the fact that there is a price drop or if you should have bought it a few months ago.

Every step of the investment process is always a dilemma. The choices we make in life is very different and it varies the sec, min, hour or days. Even having a bad day at work also affects our decision.

Factors

The following is what I personally feel affects our investment decision emotionally:

a. FOMO

b. Stock tips or special investments (never succumb to rumours)

c. New investment asset classes (It excites me because I would think it is the new BTC – 1000x)

d. Alternatives to traditional investments (Regular investments are boring seriously)

e. A bad day/heated discussions or arguments

f. People showing their wealth from certain investments

g. Unique and exclusive (Limited) investments (Pre-IPO related)

Investment knowledge comes a long way and is always revolving. I personally believe banks are growing to be passé over the longer term. Wealth Management is only required for the selected few or many. There are so many options available to invest your money into that there isn’t any need to seek any alternative opinion. If you don’t care about your own money, then no one else will. Then again, others will have no time to manage that part of their finance and will require some managers to do so for them. That said, I always like to repeat my stance about investing and it is never one size fits all.

The sole duty of investments lies on yourself. Eventually, with or without a manager/expert analyst, the investment decisions and risk is one that you take on your own. So, we can’t really blame anyone for this. Some choose to pay a premium for the service rendered to save time while others choose to DIY and explore cheaper alternatives. There is no right or wrong in doing so – However there is a difference between penny wise pound foolish.

Disclaimer

If you like what I am sharing or if it resonates with you, do use my referral codes for other services at https://atomic-temporary-178675883.wpcomstaging.com/contact/

These pictures were taken off certain website for reference.

ESG & more on Endowus & Why Endowus

On By RistrettzIn Personal Finance Series, Robo Advisors, Wealth & HealthLeave a comment

There’s a lot of hype around Robo-Advisors these days. I still go by the same rules, if nothing is broken, there isn’t a need to fix anything. Robos are here to stay for sure and they have been rather un-emotional when it comes to investing (That is a good thing by the way if you are thinking otherwise)

Trust

Trust – It is the pinnacle of consideration when you invest or put money with a certain institution. Endowus has been – I would use the word trustworthy to describe them. A lot of these have been shown in how they conduct their business. Firstly, I have a finance background and for the longest time, I’ve worked in Finance. To be honest, there wasn’t a single day I felt happy until I truly left the industry. Finance is all about numbers and money. People are motivated by the fact that they make the quickest buck from the fastest source. However, what I am seeing here is quite the opposite. They are pretty truthful and walk the talk through their actions.

The points in Summary

  • The introduction of institutional class funds. If you are not in the know, you will not know. The more funds/money you have, the more you will be in the know hence you save more on fees.
  • The exclusivity in certain funds that only that few can launch with other fund providers. Sometimes, it’s about the expertise that is focused on the fund type
  • The fund rebate. No need to explain more about it. Fund fees and rebates are very transparent and apparent in how they rebate it back.
  • Quarterly fund charges are charged only end of the quarter. I’ve never seen that before or not many does it. Most funds and banks does the front loading. The worst type of funds are ILP – They embed the bid-ask to 5% (That’s just rip off and I say that those who offer these may not even know about it)
  • First and only digital advisor to be able to use your CPF to invest. Speaks a a lot about the trust of the board to allow them to do so.

New Point to Note (& ESG)

  • Recently, they launched an ESG fund portfolio that is made up from several well known fund houses specific to the ESG criteria. It is important to invest responsibly and sustainably. ESG has been around for the longest time. In Asia, we hardly ever hear it until only recent years and by quickly moving on this front – They are really one of the fastest to bring this up to scratch. No doubt, this is one to invest for the generations to come.
  • To secure your funds, all your investments are not held in custody. You own your own account in UOB Kay Hian but the investment is managed by Endowus. This is to safeguard your own money should they decide to close down one day (which I don’t think they will in the near term)

Finally, i recently received an email from them. For the longest time, they have the bar set at an initial S$10k investment. This has been slowly reduced and to date. For every friend who invests with Endowus, you both get $20 in Access Fee credits, equivalent to $10,000 advised free for 6 months. There is no limit to the number of friends you can invite.

There is anything much to add on and nothing to complain about other than your investment and redemption takes times to complete.

Disclaimer

If you decide to sign up with Endowus, do remember to use my referral code: https://endowus.com/invite?code=EDZ8M

If you like what I am sharing or if it resonates with you, do use my referral codes for other services at https://atomic-temporary-178675883.wpcomstaging.com/contact/

These pictures were taken off Endowus website for reference.

Futu Brokerage – MooMoo Singapore Promotions

On By RistrettzIn Alternative Income, Deals, New Ideas, Personal Finance Series, Wealth & HealthLeave a comment

Here comes another brokerage in Singapore – Futu Holdings and under the Singapore name “MooMoo”? Sounds kind of fishy but legit.

From their website:

Their investors include Tencent Holdings, Matrix Partners and Sequoia Capital. Sounds decent to me.

Futu Holdings Limited (“Futu”) （NASDAQ: FUTU）is an advanced technology company transforming the investing experience by offering a fully digitized brokerage and wealth management platform .

Futu was listed on Nasdaq on March 8, 2019.

Under MooMoo, they are under the Singapore branch, https://www.moomoo.com/ and from time to time they will run a promotion to fund the brokerage account to get 1 Apple share. Although after setting up the brokerage, maybe buying Futu stocks in the US stock exchange might be a good idea given their backing.

After Tiger brokers, here come another commission free brokerage mobile platform with similar functions and good promotions. It seems like the apple share promotion has ended. If you wish to sign up for those commission free perks and/or future promotions, do use my referral code here: https://j.moomoo.com/004Fsa

  1. Currently, the promotion would run for 600 days free commissions.
  2. Also if you fund USD 2k equivalent. there is a USD30 credit.
  3. Plus free level 2 market data.

Disclaimer

If you decide to sign up with Futu Brokerage, do remember to use my referral code: https://endowus.com/invite?code=EDZ8M

If you like what I am sharing or if it resonates with you, do use my referral codes for other services at Referral and Recommendations

These pictures were taken off Futu/Moomoo website for reference.

AutoWealth – Performance Update & YTD (February 2021)

On By RistrettzIn Alternative Investments, Performance, Personal Finance Series, Robo AdvisorsLeave a comment

AutoWealth is my long-term portfolio approach. For my child’s portfolio, this is to  add on over time and have a good 20 years horizon. My only gripe is that I cant measure YTD performance. Of course, there is no reason to do that expect for measurement purposes. A time weighted performance is more of an important indicator in my opinion. Just a reminder for myself and on why I chose Autowealth:

Why Autowealth?

My two reasons for doing so is really just (a) try out one more robo advisor/segregate a portfolio for a sole purpose and (b) segregate this fund for any other purpose other than the kid’s investment journey.

Don’t sweat the small things, the costs of robo are so low. We are talking about a 15-20 year horizon here so heck those low costs. You need to pay them to keep their lights running.

Perhaps Auto Wealth is in a different segment all together but they are the ones I see positively after the other two. After signing up in June, I finally got to funding the account in September and October when markets were on the downside. The idea of doing this over the long term is to really to buy in when markets drop.

Markets will go up and each time it drops, just pick some up and let the robots do the work on balancing and re-balancing. As long as fees remains low, the portfolio will grow over time and over a longer period. It should remain in the black based on some back testing. I like it that they have already breakeven so it would be less of a pressure as a company.

As a pretty new kid on the block, it does look like they are one of those companies who keep things lean, mean and transparent for others. Many times, I do not mind paying slightly more for better service or better app/products. I speak for myself though as I do know many who penny pinch and I shall not comment more on this. My philosophy is to never sweat the small stuff – To have bigger dreams, you will have to let go of the small things. No change in Portfolio allocations.

Performance – Feb 2021

Looking at the portfolio, it is pretty expected as the market has been pretty neutral.  My investment horizon would be estimated to be 15-20 years. This is a portfolio which is set at roughly 40% equities and 60% bonds. The investment vehicles will be through ETFs. It does look like it can withstand long term peaks and troughs. What i really like is that i can switch between the SGD and USD currency performance portfolio as well as the impact on USD SGD forex on performance. USD has been steadily increasing versus the SGD.

Overall, since funding to date (in SGD currency) performance is +9.13% and I like this. The impact of USD on SGD is about -2.08% and by referencing the portfolio in USD, absolute return would be at +11.00%. No complaints thus far.

Looking into the details if I were to look at the portfolio value at $5334 (end Dec 2020) versus today at $5457. Some simple and manual YTD calculations below

YTD Performance[($5457-$5334)/$5334] x 100% = +2.30% (YTD 10 March 2021)

Disclaimer

This is not a sponsored post. This is purely my own opinion after using their service and/or products. If you like what you are seeing, do remember to check they out and do your diligence. There is no one size fits all investment strategy.

If you like what I am sharing or if it resonates with you, do use my referral codes here at Referral and Recommendations

The pictures were taken from Auto Wealth website for this article. If you need a referral code, drop me a message and you can indicate my full name during registration. From there, both of us will  get $20 each to supplement the fees.

Endowus – Performance Update & YTD (February 2021)

On By RistrettzIn Alternative Investments, Performance, Personal Finance Series, Robo AdvisorsLeave a comment

So I have been busy recently so I missed January 2021 performance update. There are just so many things to keep up with and with the pandemic still ongoing. There are just simply too many changes. At the same time working from home seems rather mundane these days. Humans as social creatures and so eventually, we cannot stay and work individually over a prolonged period of time. Plus, there are just that many telecommunications that you can make.

December through January 2021 has been interesting filled with US elections and more printing of money. In the market news, no matter the situation, a systematic approach about investing is quite important. Month on month, diversification has been really important. Slowly but surely, I’m actually feeling that Endowus and my investment goals do align pretty nicely on the investment portion.

The newly launched Cash Smart looks pretty decent. I might take a crack at that to put in some money consistently. Plus wow, if you use my referral code, you will get an addition $100 that will be added to your portion when you invest S$10k worth. So, it means referral bonus $20 for you and me (Check out my referral link at Endowus Referral Link + additional $100 for you. Only applicable for new customers of Endowus. The $100 is also available for you in the promotional LionGlobal All Seasons Fund (Growth) units after a 90 days holding period. Great news though for new investors.

SRS Portfolio

Overall, portfolio is up 15.25% since May 2020 in SGD. As usual, in USD terms, due to no FX impact as the portfolio is USD ETFs, the performance will definitely be better especially when USD is already up 3-4% versus the SGD since start of the year in 2021. Of course, the reference will be SGD since I use SGD. This is the SRS/Cash portfolio which consists of my favourite Dimension Funds in a 40% bonds/60% equity. Overall from May 2020 to 9 Mar 2021, it is a 15% increase in absolute terms – Fantastic. From Jan 2021 to 9 Mar 2021, the fund was stable with just roughly 2%+ increase in portfolio. Not too bad, knowing markets were rather choppy and moving more negative on most days so far.

In Terms of YTD returns in 2021, I’m looking at 2.34%. I’m really like what I am seeing here. Definitely topping up if there are any corrections (By definition a correction is more than 10% drop in a single day)

CPF Portfolio

For the CPF portfolio, it is also doing pretty well though not as well as my Dimension Fund portfolio. I’m still looking at 10.59% returns from May 2020 through to 9 Mar 2021.

In Terms of YTD returns in 2021, I’m looking at 0.29%. This is quite expected so not much of a surprise. I have no requirement to login daily to view my portfolio performance. Just a monthly review will be sufficient.

On a side note, the cash management accounts have started to report a decline. This is also expected since interest rate environment is here to stay for the long term.

Also, I would be looking at the new Smart Fund DIY portfolio which looks really interesting. I would definitely be looking this up as interest rates are still pretty low and I got some cash lying around.

Like every month, the pros once more:

  • Endowus is the first and only robo-advisor to be approved by the CPF board.
  • 100% trailer fees back to the consumer, not the fund management fee. This is really one of a kind I’ve seen so far.
  • They do have a decent team who makes sense when introducing their platform.
  • I believe all retail investor should try them out because of how they are trying to disrupt investing and make investing work for everyone.

Again, I will shamelessly thank all of you in advance for using my referral code.

Disclaimer

If you decide to sign up with Endowus, do remember to use my referral code: https://endowus.com/invite?code=EDZ8M

If you like what I am sharing or if it resonates with you, do use my referral codes for other services at Referral and Recommendations

These pictures were taken off Endowus website for reference.