Portfolio Updates: Dec'14

Time for a long overdue update of my portfolio. After a long 3 years hiatus :0 

This time round, besides updating about my portfolio, I will also be doing some assets allocation.  As this blog post from one of our local bloggers shows, assets allocation is equally if not more important than our skill in selecting the winning stock. This article serve as a good supporting material on why assets allocation is more important that individual stock selection. The above links provides the technical reasons for why we should know how to allocate our assets properly.

However, on a more personal level, I feel that asset allocation is very critical to me as a novice investor. This is because assets allocation allows me to have a system in place, to guide me. I am afraid that my emotions will get the better of me in times of crises, causing me to freeze in my decision making.

Hence, by following this tested and proven system, my investment decisions will be made simpler as all I have to do is to allocate my assets according to the system!

So without further ado, please allow me to 'show-hand' my humble portfolio once again :D

Current Portfolio

Total Amount in Equities: $20225.00
Percentage of Total Assets:  55.25%

Total Cash in Hand: $16378.85
Percentage of Total Assets:  44.75%

Total Assets:  $36603.85

From the above, we can see that I am about 55% invested in equities, with the balance purely in cash idling away in a low interest savings bank account.


Target Portfolio for 2015

For the upcoming year, I am going to allocate my assets into different mediums in accordance to the following percentage. This is after doing much reading, especially on the theory of "invest in equities in the percentage of 110 minus your age, with the balance in bonds".

If I follow this guide to a tee, the percentage I should be in equities will be 83% (110-27yrs old = 83%). Therefore, the amount to be in equities is as follow:

Amount in Equities = 83% of Total Assets =  $30381.20

Of the 83% in equities, I intend to tweak the percentage for each class of equities (income stocks, growth stocks, etc) . Hence, the breakdown of my equities allocation would ideally be something as follows:

Amount in ETF = 50% of Amount in Equities =  $15190.60

The bulk of the equities will be in ETF. My intention is to based my equities on a solid foundation and what better foundations are there other than a basket of solid blue-chip companies?

I will split this amount into three tranches to be invested in the STI ETF at 3 different periods of the year (April, August and December) or whenever the value of the ETF dips by 10%. This is to reduce the risk of investing at peak pricing.

Amount in Income Stocks = 40% of Amount in Equities =  $12152.48

Income Stocks will make up the second largest portion of my equities holding at 40%. The idea is to have a core of equities that will give out consistent dividends that are better than the market average. However, this comes at a cost of lower growth for these equities which I am willing to accept as price volatility usually do not swing too much most of the time.

REIT belong to this family of income stocks and I am vested entirely in REITs currently. Hence, I will have to consider divesting some of my under performing REIT holding (Yes Lippomall, I am pointing my finger at you) in order to meet my ideal portfolio allocation. 

Amount in Growth Stocks = 10% of Amount in Equities = $3038.12  

Growth Stocks will make up the remaining 10% of my equities holding. This is to whet my risk-taking appetite so as to allow the majority of my investment decisions to be made with clarity, without chasing after stocks that offers growth with huge price volatility. Moreover, there is also a chance that I might invest in a multi-bagger, improving the performance of my portfolio tremendously with minimal loss.

With the above arrangements, I have come to the end of my equities' allocations.

The remaining 17% of my portfolio shall remain in cash or the Singapore Bonds ETF when there are dips of 10%. I might also open the OCBC 360 savings account soon, where I will deposit my cash into. This is to reap the benefits of the 3.05% interest being offered by OCBC. 3.05% in interest is higher than the returns most bonds are offering anyway!

In summary, by the end of 2015, hopefully my portfolio will looks something like this:

	Percentage	Value
Portfolio Allocations
Cash/Bonds	17%	$6222.66
Equities	83%	$30381.20
Total	100%	$36603.86
Equities Allocations
ETF	50%	$15190.60
Income Stocks	40%	$12152.48
Growth Stocks	10%	$3038.12
Total	100%	$30381.2

Time for a disclaimer. Lol.

I am not saying that this method of assets allocation is the best. To be truthful, I am not even sure if this will yield me the best result. However, I genuinely feels that this asset allocation best fulfill my own requirements and most importantly, will allow me to sleep in peace at night.

Hopefully, in a year time, I will have something positive to blog about with regards to this assets allocation and we will know if it works:)

Adios~

Why Do I Invest In REIT

There are many types of business we can acquire in the market (sounds like towkay eh ;p). Some examples includes F&B business such as Old Chang Kee, supermarkets such as Sheng Siong, and my personal favourite, business dealing with real estates (malls, office space and homes).

For business dealing with real estates, there are property developers such as CapitaLand, and property owners such as Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT). REITs are essentially investments trust listed on the stock market that owns real estate assets (malls, office space, homes, etc), allowing them to receive recurring income.

Surely you can tell that I am predominantly vested in REIT by now right? So why do I prefer REIT as an investment?

Allow me to relate to you from a viewpoint of a tiny weeny insignificant retail investor as to why I prefer to invest in REITs. 

Low Barrier to Entry 
The most important reason. For someone like me who has always been interested in owning multiple properties (monopoly fanatic you see..), REITs offer me the opportunity to own real estates without requiring a huge outlay of cash unlike other real estates’ investment.

If you purchase a property on your own, it is the norm to foot a down-payment of tens of thousands of dollars, and that is not even including other hefty costs such as stamps fee, renovation, etc.

However, the cost of initiating your REITs investment can be as low as a few hundreds dollars, a sum I can comfortably afford. Therefore, REITs have enabled me to be a 'property owner' even though I do not have much capital.

Liquidity
Sales and purchases of any REITs shares can be done in a matter of minutes in the stock market. Can that be said for other real estates’ investments? I would think not.

Let's now imagine that I possess a physical property and the property market is expected to be on a downtrend in the near future. At this particular moment,  I needed cash urgently and hoped to sell my property in a downbeat market. The likelihood of me selling that property quickly is very low unless I lower my price substantially.

Should I decide not to lower my price,  I would have to wait for a long while before the property gets sold. Let's not forget for a moment that cash is required urgently and the value of the property is dropping daily during this period. Sounds kind of stressful to me indeed. Lol.

Hence, time is of the essence here. This factor is very important to small time investors like me. Investing in REIT allows me buy and sell within hours or even minutes, thus allowing me to be nimble with my limited funding.

Diversification
With limited capital, investing in REITs allow me to spread my risk amongst a number of properties and different segments of the real estate industry (industrial, retail, residential, etc.). Additionally, if I find that the local property market is over-heated, I can just choose to invest in a REIT that owns their properties in other countries.

This is as opposed to owning physical properties where my fortune could be badly affected by a single bad property investment. 

Relatively High and Constant Yield
Most REITs distribute at least 90% of their annual profit to their shareholders so as to enjoy tax breaks. Therefore, shareholders are guaranteed of obtaining recurring income as long as the REIT is making a profit.

With 90% of their profits going to their shareholders, REITs are able to offer relatively high dividends yield in the range of 5.5%-8% on average. This payout is relatively higher when compared to the dividend yield of most equities which range between 2%-4.5%.


Fuss Free 
As REITs’ properties are all managed by professional facilities management team, there are no nasty tenants for you to deal with when the pipes burst, lighting blows, etc, as they will be taken care of by the facilities management team.

When the property starts getting old, most well-run REITs will also plan for upgrading works to ensure that the value of the property does not depreciate. This is something most retail investors will not be able to execute on their own.

Liaising with tenants over complicated leasing agreements is also not required. With REITs, they have dedicated teams who will look for tenants, ensure the right tenants mix and to maximise the property revenue.

Therefore, by investing in REIT, I am able to sleep well at night as I know that the properties are well taken care of. Or maybe I am just a heavy sleeper. lol

BUT..

Investing in REIT is not without its drawbacks. When investing in REIT, we should consider these drawbacks in order to make an informed decision.

Co-relations with Broader Stock Market
Although REIT are fundamentally real estate’s investments, the value of their shares are still intrinsically tied to the stock market since they are listed there. Therefore, the value of our REIT investments will also be subjected to the stock market sentiments and not just the real estates segment. Do not be surprise if the value of your REIT investment falls even though the real estates market is holding up well. When the stock market is crashing, the value of your REIT investment WILL (confirm+chopped) drop too.

Low Cash Reserve
As the majority of the REIT’s profit goes to the stockholders, REIT usually have very little cash reserve to purchase additional properties. When there are opportunities to acquire  more properties, REIT will have to raise the cash by:

• Piling on more debts which might cause it to be overly-leveraged; 

          OR

• Issuing more shares in the market which will dilute current shareholders’ holding unless the shareholders purchase the additional shares.

The aftermath of the two action plans mentioned above will have detrimental effects on the value of our REIT investment if the REIT does not invest wisely with the cash raised. Hence, we have to look into the acquisition history of the REIT to determine if their acquisitions have been beneficial to shareholders in the long term, i.e. yield accretive. 

Links to Parent Company (Developer)
Some REITs are created by a parent company, usually a property developer, to purchase the real estates properties that are newly constructed by the parent company. The main reason for doing so is to offload the newly developed property into the REIT in exchange for quick capital in which the parent company would be able to reinvest into.

This strategy sounds great theoretically. The REIT has first choice when it comes to the sales of the property while the parent company would have access to fast cash raised by the REIT to purchase the property.

However, what happens if the parent company decides to make their subsidiary REIT pay for an overpriced property?

Therefore, we have to check if the REIT has a tendency of purchasing overvalued properties from its parent company so as to maximise the value of our REITs investment.

Currency Fluctuation for Overseas Assets
As with other investments that have assets and earnings from overseas, REIT investment is similarly subjected to currency volatility if they insufficiently hedged against it.

This factor will have a great impact on our REITs investment if the vast amount of the REIT earnings and assets originate from overseas. A 20% drop in the value of the currency will result in not just a 20% drop in earnings, but also a 20% drop in the value of the REIT assets. This will most likely cause a massive drop in the REIT share price as the investors start panic selling.

Personally, I have experienced this issue with my investment in Lippomall. The value of my Lippomall shares dropped by more than 20% due to the devaluation of the Indonesia Rupiah, which is where most of Lippomall's revenue is accounted for. This is even though the REIT is reporting healthy profits in terms of Rupiah!

Hence, we must have an understanding of the currency exchange situation in which the REIT is involved in. By understanding, we will be able to avoid or mitigate losses similar to what I had faced with Lippomall.

Lippomall REIT. One painful lesson which I'll blog in detail someday:(

To sum it all up, investing in REIT has both its rewards and drawbacks. Only by understanding both  then are we able to determine if investing in REIT fits our investment profile.

For example, if you are in your 20′s and have a very high tolerance for risk with the expectation of high returns within a short time horizon, REIT investment might not be your cup of tea. This is because the steady returns from investing in REIT will never allow you to obtain the high returns you desire in such a short period of time.

In my case, I am satisfied with the steady returns from investing in REIT. However, I feel rather discomfort with the recent volatility in the market, which is affecting the value of these REITs. I am not saying that my reasons for REIT investments are no longer relevant. I just feel that I might have allocate too much of my portfolio to REIT.

On another note, I have been lurking around in the following thread:
- http://forums.hardwarezone.com.sg/money-mind-210/*official*-shiny-things-club-4866757.html

Very informative and perhaps I might even adjust my portfolio, base on some of the advices being dished out over there. With a little tweaking of my own of course.

3 Years in Review (2012 to 2014) and Goals Setting for 2015

Hi fellow Peons! It has been a long while since I last blogged hasn't it? :p

3 years to be exact. Much have happened in these 3 years by the way. I had three job changes, proposed to my partner, gotten my BTO flat, etc.

Can't wait for it to be ready by 2017:D

All these events are significant chapters of my life and some of these events have offered painful life lessons due to my naivety. Hopefully, I will have the time to blog about these events retrospectively in the near future while my memories are fresh.

Coming back to the topic, let's firstly start off with the review of my goals as of December 2014.

In 2012, I stated that my goals were as follows: 

1. Sorting out my insurance coverage.
2. Increase monthly dividend payout to $50.
3. Achieve honors grades for my part time studies.
4. Gain significant in-depth knowledge on Fundamental Analysis. 

Three years later, as we reach the end of 2014, my progresses are as follows: 

1) Sorted out my insurance coverage in February 2012. Explained in detailed HERE. 

2) My monthly dividend payout has hit $101.87 as of end 2014. Not very commendable if you ask me. Even though I managed to exceed my initial target of $50 monthly, it has taken me three years to hit this amount. That is a less than 38% increase annually! Hardly sufficient to be considered a "passive income", much less feed a peon like me!

3) Two words to describe. EPIC FAIL. I failed two of the modules and was caught for plagiarism for one of my assignments. Received a warning letter from the school to boot. So much for aiming to achieve honors for my degree =_=". Guess this is an inherent characteristic of mine, always being uninterested in school. With such set-backs, I will never be able to achieve my goal of getting honors grading for my current course.

4) This goal can neither be quantified nor measured. I am sure I have gained some considerable investment knowledge this past three years. What I cannot be sure of, is that this knowledge can be considered significant enough. This is lousy goal setting and I will revised it for the upcoming goals setting for 2015.

Now that the review of my 2012 goals completed, lets move on to my goals for 2015.

GOALS for 2015

• Increase monthly dividends income to $150 (50% increases from $101.87).  

• Get through my remaining semesters of my studies without further failures.  

• Posting at least two entries on this blog per month, of which one blog posting must be on issues relating to financial literacy or research.

• Get to know at least two other people with similar interest in financial literacy.

• Career advancement in my regular job (gets promoted to the next level).

With this, I have completed my goals setting and review. 

I fervently hope I will be able to achieve these goals and will do my utmost to achieve them. I have faced several setbacks these past few years, such as my family situation as well as my career instability, which have made my life extremely patchy. However, I have also encountered uplifting moments too, such as my successful proposal and my mum recovery from 3rd stage cancer.

I guess what they say about life is true, full of ups and downs moment. Looking forward to more 'ups' moments anyway. Who doesn't:p

In a couple of months, it will be the start of a new year and I will be 27 years old. Hence, I wish for a very successful and enriching year for all of us in the new year! 

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Picture of Mt Fuji taken during my Japan trip in 2013. Did a solo (80% of the time) tour of the country. Have to admit that it was an extremely emboldening experience in a lovely country rich in culture. Can't wait to travel there again. I will highly encourage everyone to make a trip to Japan once in their lifetime. No regrets (cross my heart)!