Hey all! Firstly, thank you to the very kind people who pinged me asking where I’ve been hiding for the last few weeks. The combination of an EXTREMELY busy time at work, refinancing my mortgage, and just generally having a heck of a lot of stuff going on has meant I’ve had to let a lot of things slide for a few weeks. (I even took a two-week break from Animal Crossing, which is how you know things are REALLY serious. There were so many rotten turnips when I got back. So many turnips.)
But this weekend, the sun is shining, the breeze is blowing, and I’m sitting out on my balcony with a coffee in hand and ready to see how everyone’s doing.
On that note, it’s been nearly two years since the third edition of
Rich by Retirement hit the stands, and a lot has changed since it went to press. MBKE has shut down their extremely generous brokerage offering. IBKR has launched a Singapore entity. We’ve seen the ‘rona meltdown back in March, another stupendous rally in bonds and global stocks, Singaporean stocks have flatlined since March, but those dividends...
What would you all think about a 2021 revision of Rich By Retirement—would that be something you’d be interested in? And what would you like me to write about that didn’t get enough coverage in previous editions?
(And my offer to any Singaporean brokers that want to build their own robo-advisor and want me to help design it... that still stands!)
I wonder when it come a day when BBCWatcher and Shiny Things start to move on with their life or this forum close down, will IWDA and EIMI drop
As I believe many people here are following the standard recommendation
Oh man, I’m flattered that you think I’m big enough to move markets…!
Hello
ICLN, clean energy ETF,
any reviews on this, ST and company?
Here’s a dirty (well, slightly grubby) little secret of the ETF industry—fund managers will launch a huge range of thematic ETFs to see which ones get traction, and shut down the ones that don’t. Occasionally, a fund manager will have a hit like HACK (a cybersecurity ETF) or JETS (US airlines) that attracts a huge pile of retail money and makes them a cartload of management fees; in search of that one big winner, the fund managers will launch ETFs linked to literally any theme that’s trendy.
Anyway, no, I don’t think this is a particularly good investment. Not that I don’t like the idea of solar power (which is what most of ICLN is, with a few wind bits as well); solar power is cheap, clean, and if you strap a battery to it you can now solve the peaking problem that’s bedeviled green energy for decades. But it’s also hyper-competitive; prices and margins are collapsing all throughout the value chain; and you’d better believe the energy majors (BP, RDS, Exxon) see what’s coming and will be plowing zillions of dollars into clean energy over the next few decades as well.
Is it still worth to invest in STI ETF in this climate?
seem going to be the same level for long long time
I just wonder shld I continue my DCA
Yep. Look, the STI has not been a great performer since the ‘rona. It’s been hit by two forces: its sectoral makeup (heavy on banks and real estate), and the unpopularity of anything that’s not US tech equities. You’re waiting for Singapore to become popular again, and there are two things working in your favor:
1) One of the key principles of dollar-cost-averaging is that you’re buying things that are cheap, and selling things that are expensive. Singaporean stocks are CHEAP right now, so you’re able to buy a lot of them; and,
2) You’re getting “paid to wait”, and paid fabulously well at that. Even after the big three banks had their dividend capped, Singaporean stocks are still yielding mid-3-percent (better than you’ll get in the bank), and the banks are
fabulously well capitalized. They have the strongest capital bases of any bank in the world. So when the MAS relaxes the dividend cap, they’ll be able to start fountaining dividends like they were before.
does anyone have experience with the etoro broker platform?
seems really interesting to be able to copy portfolio of someone
Hell no.
Look, firstly, Etoro isn’t so much a “broker platform” as it is a thinly veiled online casino. Some brokers are optimized for investing, some for active trading, and Etoro is very much the latter.
Secondly, a lot of Etoro’s offerings are “contracts for difference”, where you don’t own the actual stock - you just own a highly-leveraged bet on the stock. Again, it’s gambling, not investing.
Thirdly: copy trading is a bad idea. If the people you’re copying were actually any good, they’d be able to take their skills to any prop shop or hedge fund on the street, and make a lot more money than they’ll make from Etoro.
And even if they’re not good, copy trading will still make them rich and make you poor, because traders with big followings can easily front-run their own moves: buy some stock in a different account, then buy the same stock in their Etoro account, and watch zillions of copy-trading muppets ramp the price up so they can sell the original stock and make a nice little payday for themselves.
Don’t use Etoro. Don’t encourage them.
Guys. I’ve some excess HKD in my brokerage account. How can I mange this idle HKD? Is there some mmf/elf I can buy without fees? Thanks
Why do you need HKD in the first place? Unless you have some specific need for it, you’ll want to convert them back to SGD.
Hi everyone, I just finished reading ST's book and have a question.
I'm keen to start investing at $1k/mth with a 40-40-20 allocation to ES3-IWDA-MBH.
It's mentioned that each month, we should buy whatever we are short of.
Does this mean that I shouldn't apply for an RSP with, say, FSMOne and have them automatically invest $400 and $200 respectively into ES3 and MBH each month? Should I instead be manually purchasing whatever I am short of at that point of time to hit the target allocation of 40-40-20?
Are there any drawbacks to using RSPs with FSMOne for local ETFs?
It’s not a HUGE drawback. I used to be very disinclined to recommend FSMOne, because they charged unnecessarily high custodian fees; now, it’s just that using a set-and-forget RSP makes it a little trickier to buy IWDA at the same time.
Hi ST, BBCW
What would be a good ETF which meets the following criteria?:
- Focuses on Asian markets (including ANZ but ex Japan)
- No sectoral bias
My first question would be “why do you want this - why are you tilting toward AXJ? You need something more than just ‘I saw a newspaper article that said it was a good idea’.”.
That said, I think
CPXJ LN does what you want, and at a low cost too.
I also had one question come in over the wires, which is one I get a lot, so I might even add it to the FAQ:
A reader by email said:
Why do you not recommend paying for Critical Illness in the term life plan?
I did my own intensive research on critical illnesses and saw that it was something that was necessary. Especially situations whereby I am ill, but not dead and in a coma for example. This would activate the CI rider.
Ahh, here’s the thing, you’ve been taken in by the insurance firms’ marketing. Critical illness riders are a big money-maker for the insurance companies, so they like to scare you into paying for CI by asking you to imagine “what if you were in a coma? What would you do?”.
The truth is, once it’s properly set up, your emergency fund will tide you and your family over while you’re incapacitated and unable to work; and your Medishield will take care of the hospital costs. You don’t need to pay extra for that.
If your emergency fund isn’t big enough to cover your expenses, you can also investigate disability income insurance, which is what you
really want. It’s cheaper than a CI rider, and it’s more precisely tailored to what you care about: replacing your income if you can’t work.
