STE's Stocks Investing Journey

< Sleep Is Your SuperPower by Matt Walker > by TED Talks J.P. Morgan once had a friend who was so worried about his' stock holdings that he could not sleep at night. The friend asked, ‘What should I do about my stocks?’ Morgan replied, ‘Sell down to your sleeping point’ Every investor must decide the trade-off he or she is willing to make between eating well and sleeping well. High investment rewards can only be achieved at the cost of substantial risk-taking. So what is your sleeping point? Finding the answer to this question is one of the most important investment steps you must take. –  Burton Malkiel Worries, doubts, and anxieties are normal and part and partial of our life. It’s quite natural to worry about our unpaid bill, an upcoming job interview, or even where to go for our first date. Our worry increase during this COVID 19 pandemic, especially worrying about losing our job, money not enough, losing our investment in stocks. As a retiree, we worry abo...

<image credit to: stockinvestor.com> Why is Wall Street soaring while Main Street is burning? <source : nbcnews.com> The terms “ Wall Street” vs “Main Street” gets tossed around a lot in conversations about the financial industry recently and continue being headlines in major newspapers or financial portals. Just months into the coronavirus crisis, many are already pointing to the striking contrast between what has happened to the real economy and financial markets a.k.a “Wall Street vs Main Street” conundrum.   “Mr Market “ is irrational, as usual, while millions of peoples around the world had lost their jobs due to this COVID 19 pandemic and economy are expecting to shrink with weaker consumer demand and lowest PMI, yet stock market soar, to a level almost same as in pre-COVID market environment, a perfect “ V ” shape recovery. The huge divergence and disconnection between these two “ streets “ caught many of us by surprise.

A Shrinking “ Panadol ”! I think this is the predicament for all of us as “income or dividend “ investors, seeing our dividend received have a big " cut" or totally disappear like the case of “ HSBC ”. We have noticed that most  REITs start to be more prudent in their latest distribution and conserving more cash during this Covid-19 pandemic. So far, banks like DBS still trying to maintain their quarterly dividend but I guess at some point, they also would have to cut their dividend if this crisis prolongs. As investors, we will also need to be more “realistic “ in our expectation, a 6-7% yield of stocks might become a thing of the past, especially if we look at the “ultra-low “ interest rate environment. Look at the interest rate for the latest SSB ( Singapore Saving Bond ) , for 10 years AAA bond is merely around 1%. Just guess how much you will get from the bank’s FD rate? Suddenly, I felt more than happy and contented with my money i...

image credit to newscientist.com In the past few months, we have seen the significant impact on Covid-19 pandemic to our economy and life in general. The world economy suddenly stops due to lockdown, the stock market plunged into a bear market in fastest speed. We have many unprecedented things happened recently, oil future dropped to negative territory, US jobless claims hit 30 mils in just six-week after lockdown, the  unlimited stimulus plan (money printing) from world central bankers, world country’s PMI plunges to record low etc…

What makes me want to stop working in the midst of high career path and promising career advancement? You don’t suddenly wake up and walked into your boss room ， tender your resignation letter and saying that you want to R.E (retire early) although you have achieved F.I and unless you have other plan like setting up your own business or helping the family to run the business etc.     First of all, allow me to share a few good blog-posts on   F.I and R.E   and some misconception of people about F.I.R.E before telling the " untold story " about my decision to R.E . As I mentioned before, to achieve F.I is a must and should be our ultimate goal, whereas to decide whether to have early retirement or not is very personal and depends on individual's wish and circumstances, R.E is just an option.

image credit to Bloomberg.com via seekingalpha.com We have experienced the fastest and furious " Bear" ever in market history. It only took less than 20 days for Dow Jones Index to reach the bear market ( i.e corrected more than 20% from the peak). This is the situation we never experience even in GFC 2008/09 . We have seen some of the REITs dropped in double digits % continuously in a few days and we can see that most of the REITs are having 50% sales now.

<image credit to focuspointtechnologies.com> Nothing last forever, everything moves in a  cycle like four seasons, we have a rough and roller coastal ride on our stocks market in the last two weeks.  World stocks market finally succumbed to this “deadly and widely spread Covid-19 “ pandemic and most of it enters bear market territory in just two weeks of continuous & severe plunging. The magnitude of the fall accelerated by the “tumbled “ of oil price due to OPEC’s failure to come to an agreement on supply cut, it doesn’t help during this low demand situation due to Covid-19 pandemic, a kind of double whammy impact.