*Official* Shiny Things club - Part 2

[Maeda_Toshiie]

Hi everyone,

Bear with me, I'm not too financially savvy.

I've begun putting my regular investments into the three (IWDA, STI, and MBH).

I want to maintain a tidy system of tracking my investment finances, something like an excel sheet or otherwise, however, I've run into an issue -

If I were to do the above, would I input the amount I've put in or the amount that its currently worth? For example I DCA 300 monthly into the STI, do I count it as 1500 after 5 months or the amount its currently worth based on the market?

Because the latter would seem to go against the idea of leaving my money in there and ignoring the **** out of it, pardon my language.

Just trying to get an understanding of what would be a good form of managing my numbers.

Thank you.

I personally track both: the amount being put in per month and hence the amount so far being injected into the portfolio, then the current market value of my portfolio in terms of investments held plus the amount of dividends received.

Is standard chartered still the best for buying IWDA if I’m doing DCA quarterly?

Yes, especially if your amount is low, ie a few hundreds per transaction.

 

[cplusplus]

Yes, especially if your amount is low, ie a few hundreds per transaction.

Specifically doing 3k usd per quarter, with fees of 20+ usd, standard chartered is the best right?

At which point should I consider another broker?

Also, is doing RSP with invest saver best to invest for STI ETF? 500sgd per month. Should I also get SSB at 500 sgd per month as well?

 

[flowerpalms]

Oh i got it. @BBCwatcher

Since i have more than 6 months of emergency funds and Aviva offers 3 or 6 months of waiting period i should choose the longest 6 months to pay the lower premium.

Correct me if i am wrong

 

[Wonderer haha]

Mind I checking with you?

1. So do you want a life/term insurance or endowment plan? They are not really the same based on what I understand (correct me if I am wrong). If you want to have a more affordable premium on your current plan, how about try to cancel some of the riders (eg CI or early CI), but keep the death benefit, TPD, and TI. Will this help (you might not need to surrender the whole plan)?

2. Is it better to get another plan covered before surrender any of your current plans (shield/endowment/etc). What if something bad (hope not to) happens, and you current plan(s) was cancelled, while the "new" insurance haven't get approved/activated yet. To me, it is a small sum of money I am willing to spend (1-2 months).

3. Paying premium annually might be better (looks cheaper) based on my understanding. I am not a financial planner/working in finance industry so not sure it is true for all insurance company out there, but it is for Pru.

4. Is it useful to change your payment period from 15 to 25 years? The total sum you paid for 25 years should be greater that those 15 years, but paying the premium in 15 years also means that you need to allocate more money to the premium (15 vs 25). Not sure your are able or can to save those if your make 25 years premium but whatever you spare can be used for investment. And what if this scenario happens - something bad happens in your 16th years? For a 15 years policy you can't do much for the premium as you already done the payment. But for a 25 years policy, your policy will get terminated/reduced in values once the claim is made (reduced values in your policy also translates to a lesser premium to pay for the remaining policy). Not sure I am making sense in here, BBC/other gurus care to advise?

Thanks.

My priority now is to cancel the endowment first and get back whatever surrender value there is.

Will retain the Myshield hospital plan with Aviva as i would still like to be 100% covered with the rider. If i were to port over this to Ntuc income, i have only co payment riders (wef Apr 2019)

Dii/term life/tpd will come later. Noted on careshield life entitlement.

 

[flowerpalms]

Mind I checking with you?

Hmm am sorry but i dont think i can answer your questions already

What i can say is that Aviva Idealincome which is their disability income insurance has a 35% discount of the premium for applications until 31st Dec 2019.

I have whatsapp my agent to help me process the following:
Please note the myshield downgrade is from Class A to standard while remaining 100% covered (old existing plan) and not the co payment rider

 

[BBCWatcher]

Since i have more than 6 months of emergency funds and Aviva offers 3 or 6 months of waiting period i should choose the longest 6 months to pay the lower premium.

Correct me if i am wrong

Exactly. To extract the most value out of precious premium dollars, it's better to get a higher monthly payout amount rather than a shorter waiting period.

I have whatsapp my agent to help me process the following:
Please note the myshield downgrade is from Class A to standard while remaining 100% covered (old existing plan) and not the co payment rider

MyShield Plan 3 is not the Standard Plan. Plan 3 is an "as charged" plan, designed to cover public hospital B1 ward. And...I don't think it's the first place you ought to look to scrape up premium (or other) dollars. One reason is that it halves your annual limit compared to Plan 2 ($300K versus $600K), and I wouldn't do that. Yes, it takes some "hard work" to blow through $300K of medical expenses in a public hospital (and in pre-/post-hospitalization treatment), but it's much easier to do that than to blow past $600K. Also remember you might have to live with that annual limit for life, and $600K won't be worth as much in 2049, for example. Did you look at the premium savings in your age bracket, which is MediSave savings for the base plan? It isn't much, not yet.

I recommend you check with Great Eastern and AIA as well, and get sample policy letters so you can review T&Cs. Sometimes the job/role classification can end up with shockingly different premium quotations, and it's possible that Aviva could fall on the wrong side of that equation. You just never know.

 

[linuskltan]

Specifically doing 3k usd per quarter, with fees of 20+ usd, standard chartered is the best right?

At which point should I consider another broker?

Also, is doing RSP with invest saver best to invest for STI ETF? 500sgd per month. Should I also get SSB at 500 sgd per month as well?

If you consider the SCB SGD to USD one-way forex spread of ~0.8%, I believe Interactive Brokers should be cheaper, as SCB quarterly fees should come up to more than USD 34 vs IB's USD 10/mth x 3 mths.

 

[Converged]

Hmm - good question.

IWDA: cheap, good, liquid, you don’t actually need emerging-markets exposure that much;

IWDA + EIMI: more expensive, higher transaction costs, why bother when VWRA exists;

VWRA: cheap for what it is but a higher expense ratio than IWDA, do you actually need emerging-markets exposure?

So its okay for us to purchase just iwda?


Sent from Area 51 using GAGT

 

[Maeda_Toshiie]

Specifically doing 3k usd per quarter, with fees of 20+ usd, standard chartered is the best right?

At which point should I consider another broker?

At that amount, you can be buying 1k usd per month, and with IBKR to get lower fx costs.

Also, is doing RSP with invest saver best to invest for STI ETF? 500sgd per month. Should I also get SSB at 500 sgd per month as well?

At 500 per month, that is the cheapest way.

Generally, A35 or MBH is preferred over using SSB for the bond component. SSB is capital guaranteed, but the redemption is long compared to publicly listed financial instruments, and you don't get the negative correlation with equities (usually when flight to safety occurs in the market).

Meanwhile SSB is very good for the bulk of your emergency funds (of course, given the lag time of redemption, you should still have some in cash for emergencies of emergencies).

So its okay for us to purchase just iwda?

Sent from Area 51 using GAGT

Yes. There is no need to get too fancy right now.

 

[Maeda_Toshiie]

Oh yeah, BoJo in action:

https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/1163039609586180097

 

[Han Shot First]

I am currently invested in IWDA. but i am curious in moneyOwl Dimensional fund advisor (DFA), is it a good way to DCA? their total charges adds up to 1.17%p.a. though (0.65 p.a. for moneyowl, 0.18 for ifast platform and 0.34% for DFA funds)

Well that’s your answer right there. You can pay 1.17% every year in fees through MoneyOwl, or 0.2% every year by buying IWDA. Which would you rather?

Costs matter. I read that cost is the best predictor for performance / returns. However, are costs the only metric one needs to focus on when comparing different ETFs / mutual funds?

Dimensional Fund Advisors (DFA) claim a reputation (DFA showed some statistics on their website to justify the claim) for being able to outperform a benchmark index (some of the time) compared to other fund managers. Not sure if the claimed outperformance can compensate for the cost difference of 0.97% (= 1.17% - 0.20%) imposed by MoneyOwl.

 

[Converged]

At that amount, you can be buying 1k usd per month, and with IBKR to get lower fx costs.



At 500 per month, that is the cheapest way.

Generally, A35 or MBH is preferred over using SSB for the bond component. SSB is capital guaranteed, but the redemption is long compared to publicly listed financial instruments, and you don't get the negative correlation with equities (usually when flight to safety occurs in the market).

Meanwhile SSB is very good for the bulk of your emergency funds (of course, given the lag time of redemption, you should still have some in cash for emergencies of emergencies).



Yes. There is no need to get too fancy right now.

Thank you. So when should i purchase eimi?

Sent from Area 51 using GAGT

 

[tangent314]

Specifically doing 3k usd per quarter, with fees of 20+ usd, standard chartered is the best right?

IBKR is better.
SCB fees for US$3000 is .9% * 3000 + 10.7 = US$37.70

 

[tangent314]

Dimensional Fund Advisors (DFA) claim a reputation (DFA showed some statistics on their website to justify the claim) for being able to outperform a benchmark index (some of the time) compared to other fund managers. Not sure if the claimed outperformance can compensate for the cost difference of 0.97% (= 1.17% - 0.20%) imposed by MoneyOwl.

I would call BS on that. Sounds just like cherry picking.

 

[limster]

I would call BS on that. Sounds just like cherry picking.

which fund manager will say that they are unable to outperform the index?

 

[flowerpalms]

I am waiting for my agent's reply today on how to proceed.

I hope to terminate the Mylifechoice immediate and not pay the monthly premium $256.70 start from Sept

Exactly. To extract the most value out of precious premium dollars, it's better to get a higher monthly payout amount rather than a shorter waiting period.


MyShield Plan 3 is not the Standard Plan. Plan 3 is an "as charged" plan, designed to cover public hospital B1 ward. And...I don't think it's the first place you ought to look to scrape up premium (or other) dollars. One reason is that it halves your annual limit compared to Plan 2 ($300K versus $600K), and I wouldn't do that. Yes, it takes some "hard work" to blow through $300K of medical expenses in a public hospital (and in pre-/post-hospitalization treatment), but it's much easier to do that than to blow past $600K. Also remember you might have to live with that annual limit for life, and $600K won't be worth as much in 2049, for example. Did you look at the premium savings in your age bracket, which is MediSave savings for the base plan? It isn't much, not yet.

I recommend you check with Great Eastern and AIA as well, and get sample policy letters so you can review T&Cs. Sometimes the job/role classification can end up with shockingly different premium quotations, and it's possible that Aviva could fall on the wrong side of that equation. You just never know.

 

[cplusplus]

At that amount, you can be buying 1k usd per month, and with IBKR to get lower fx costs.



At 500 per month, that is the cheapest way.

Generally, A35 or MBH is preferred over using SSB for the bond component. SSB is capital guaranteed, but the redemption is long compared to publicly listed financial instruments, and you don't get the negative correlation with equities (usually when flight to safety occurs in the market).

Meanwhile SSB is very good for the bulk of your emergency funds (of course, given the lag time of redemption, you should still have some in cash for emergencies of emergencies)

So based on the calculation done by tangent below, I can actually do monthly DCA on iwda and incur lower costs on IBKR vs doing quarterly on standard chartered? If I understand correctly, IBKR charges inactivity fees but if I’m buying monthly then those fees won’t apply. So I’m only paying for the commission for each share + forex to usd. Is that correct?

Other than RSP, which broker can I use to purchase STI ETF or the bonds ETF? POSB charges 1% iirc. Is there a better broker?

Also, if I’m putting in 2k sgd per month, 42.5% iwda, 42.5% sti etf and 15% A35. Does that make sense?

IBKR is better.
SCB fees for US$3000 is .9% * 3000 + 10.7 = US$37.70

Thank you.

 

[BBCWatcher]

which fund manager will say that they are unable to outperform the index?

An index fund manager.

 

[ChinoGirl]

Just to share that POSB IS currently charges 0.82% for purchase of G3B. No commission for partial or full redemption.

So based on the calculation done by tangent below, I can actually do monthly DCA on iwda and incur lower costs on IBKR vs doing quarterly on standard chartered? If I understand correctly, IBKR charges inactivity fees but if I’m buying monthly then those fees won’t apply. So I’m only paying for the commission for each share + forex to usd. Is that correct?

Other than RSP, which broker can I use to purchase STI ETF or the bonds ETF? POSB charges 1% iirc. Is there a better broker?

Also, if I’m putting in 2k sgd per month, 42.5% iwda, 42.5% sti etf and 15% A35. Does that make sense?



Thank you.

 

[tangent314]

So based on the calculation done by tangent below, I can actually do monthly DCA on iwda and incur lower costs on IBKR vs doing quarterly on standard chartered? If I understand correctly, IBKR charges inactivity fees but if I’m buying monthly then those fees won’t apply. So I’m only paying for the commission for each share + forex to usd. Is that correct?

IBKR US$10/month is a monthly minimum commission fee. If you are doing US$1000 per month, your bill will look something like this every month:

$2.00 - Minimum commission for FX
$1.70 - Minimum commission for IWDA purchase on LSE
$6.30 - $10 minus whatever you have spent above
-----
$10.00 - Total

Basically If you spend less than $10 in the month, they will charge you whatever it takes it make it up to $10.

Other than RSP, which broker can I use to purchase STI ETF or the bonds ETF? POSB charges 1% iirc. Is there a better broker?

Above $610 per month it becomes better to go with OCBC BCIP for STI ETF. Above $1k per month it becomes better to go with OCBC BCIP for A35.