Cory Diary : Revisiting Thought Process - Portfolio

Decision Making

Back to Radar View to conceptualize my thinking .... on my investment size in each counter.

There are 3 scale markers in the chart with 0%, 5% and 10%.

For those who find it hard to read, the radar view display my investment size for each counter with those in the center has the larger allocation. Sitting on the most outer ring has zero investment now eg. HRnetGroup, PrkwayLfie Reit and Mapletree com Tr.

This year return so far hits XIRR 6.5% today which is pretty close to 6.4% profit year to date. Thanks to Reits/Trusts and the US stocks rebounding which I suffered from last year

 I still find amazing how far CMT has run. Even at this price or yield, I would not sell because with so much cash in the system is quite hard to find one that can give me 5% dividends with possible growths. Ascendas still has good yield in it despite the run up. If I have a chance I would acquire more but since it has hits 11% level, I need to be prudent despite my confidence.

Overall, the colours proportion is probably where I wanted with the blue dots growth/speculative occupying lower percentages and Red dots moving up slowly. I did not do fund injection this year yet as I moved some fund to up my SSB. I would be working to up a little more cash to fill it up to 50K dividend level plan.

Below is my thought process on why I do changes in my portfolio.

First Decision : Remove HRnetGroup(CHZ.SI)

Never could remember which is cap in the name ... (joking on the remove reason but is real I could not remember). I was finding option to reduce my counters and this came up. I like the story of the company but the stock just refuse to move (see link is at bottom of bubble) . Soon I realize this is not my type of stock. Another reason i could squeeze myself to think of just to make myself happy is that is buying up companies the right option for their type of businesses. Will they have moat and withholding power of their clients ? I could be wrong and stock shoot up after but I can live with it.

Second Decision : Remove Mapletree Com Tr(N2IU.SI)

The yield comes down to low 5%. There are no catalyst coming. I got enough capital gains. With CMT, FCT and Mapletree NAC Tr, I don't see a need for another Mall-like reit taking another spot in my portfolio.

Third Decision : Add Sheng Siong(OV8.SI)

This SS has been with me in and out for at least 5 years. Always bring me good luck kopi money. This supermarket player is simply well-managed at least on reporting front. The boss has the passion in him. I miss this counter so much after last sold at lower price than I I bought back some recently. Yes in love with it but I aren't irrational. So I come in again at smaller amount. If there is a SME counter to occupy a place, I want SS. China play seems minor so far. I will need to understand better but this won't my decision.

Fourth Decision : Add UOB(U11.SI)

I got enough exposure to OCBC and STI Index. Regardless every time Index move up, my performance still lag behind. One fix is to add more financial stock so I choose UOB. Sadly, DBS could have been better from recent reporting events. Nevertheless, the size is testing water. I have the understanding that DBS is higher up due to deliberate higher dividends given which could suffer if there is a change for lower later whereas OCBC and UOB have been a little conservative. Hope they do us proud....

5th Decision : Add more Ascendas-hTrust(Q1P.SI)

Got good gains from earlier investment. I still feel it has some more legs to go else if it go much lower I could consider to acquire bigger amount. Since it go higher, I decided to average up a little. The yield is pretty decent for seems like good acquisition by the management. I would be surprise to see poor results for next few reporting but we never can guaranteed therefore I demand better yield which it has. The market seems to have undervalue it.

Cory

2019-0226

Cory Diary : Royal Flush, Cory Bubbles

Is like a Royal Flush bubble picture. Looks like everyone is above the zero line. Technically the new entrants aren't due to transaction cost. If we look at the chart closely, STI ETF aren't the tallest but in percentage term it does relatively well against my portfolio. 5 of the stocks registered double digits gains. 

Feb is another good month and I do not want to wait for it to end to blog. Dividend stocks driving more profitability. Took the opportunity to buy a little UOB today after Sheng Siong this week. I have been controlling my shooting.... . Mapletree Com Tr is out as it hits my profitability on yield which do not much complement my portfolio now. Realized 6.2% gains from it.

Naturally the bigger bubble has higher absolute profitability and risen the most as in the chart when prices go up. The good news are they have risen further. There are some laggards. HRnetGroup and  OCBC are in so so state. If one is to do a quick look, the drivers are Trust and Reits. Portfolio XIRR 6.2%. I am smiling this month. Hope it lasts !!!


Cory
2019-0222

Cory Diary : Intelligence comes with responsibility

The Saga of Hyflux has been burning for quite some period of time. As usual when something like such in trouble, investor community especially retirees will be affected. Unlike HPH Tr, Sabana Reit, Noble or S-Chips, listed Hyflux do produces Power other than Water to the Public both tied to basic essentials for our Island State survivals.

However every time when I hear someone vested in Hyflux Preference Shares or Stocks they have the mentality that Ah Gong will not let it fails and that due to it's necessity, the investment will not go wrong. And this is where most investors could precisely get it wrong. Being essential does not mean it can't go bust as a listed company.

When I Invest in Hyflux Preference shares previously, I do stress out that it can go bust. In the end, I decided to cut loss to de-risk myself from it. Fortunately, manage to do it with really minimal impact of kopi size money. And this has been my strategy consistently. For historical view, I have avoided big or limited impacts from Sabana, Hyflux PS, Design Studio, Ouhua, Koda, MTQ, MunSiong, QAF, Starhub, SoilbuildBiz Reit, and the lists go on. Most successfully with just a few 5 digits losses.

How does all this got to do with my Diary you may say ?

Here's the article from BT.

https://www.businesstimes.com.sg/energy-commodities/power-generation-sector-crushed-by-massive-overcapacity

Not surprisingly, people starts questioning why our electricity prices did not comes down over the years ? And then we hear anti-government rhetoric starting out. Firstly of all we need to understand that this is written by journalist and with all well intention, could never be able to consider every angle of public opinions. They are humans not robots. And is up to the maturity of the public to derive their own perspective after reading it which we will surprise ourselves too that being highly educated, investment savvy and professionally experienced, we could get into wrong conclusion. And that's the power of media.

Here's the table of USEP prices.

If we care to look into the detail, the peak is even higher at 263. Interesting 2005 and 2018 are at the lower ends generally. This is across 13 years ! So trying to derive from BT reporting and link it to why we are not paying lower price is not that straight forward. The general average is around 140 so who is paying for them when the prices are high in 2007, 2009 to 2013 ? And if we consider inflation and cost to manage the overall, how will this works out ? 

I would expect prices to go higher with inflation but it doesn't ! One thing for sure there is some mechanism and buffering in-place to keep them as stable as possible but don't kid ourselves in that if the suppliers have not face stiff competitions, our electrical prices would not have rocketed to the moon. Hyflux probably has done a huge national service but I am not sure everyone appreciate Olivia works. In national level perspective, is certainly safer to be on over supply to lower our living cost. 

Before I sign off. Intelligence comes with responsibility. Not to throw oil into fire. Investors in Hyflux suffers enough so don't aggravated their suffering longer. Teach them to realize their mistake and how to invest better would certainly help. Be a part of the change.

Cory

2019-0216

Cory Diary : Misses

There are always a list of hot stocks, speculative pennies, blue chips and investible in most people radar scope who are familiar with the markets. Often one of them will spikes or dives, and chances are the stocks were once in your investment considerations.

As we grow older, the misses get more. Don't be disheartened ! Is natural as we come to know more stocks. The last thing we want is to start frantic actions to spot the next to avoid misses. We can never be able to catch most of them but likely slips into oblivion trying to do so .... 

Draw a plan and try to stick to it.

1. Dividend Strategy, Growth, and with Sufficient diversification ie. constant lookout
2. Assess Risk for each of them and target dividend amount ie. follow news, read report ...
3. Maintain with care, small pool of growth/speculative stock to keep our blood warm enough with the market. Even then there should be fundamental business behind it and which report we can likely depend on.

Misses will not affects our returns. Wild ride will. We should ignore those noises and spend more quality time with family like with baby. (change nappy time ... :P )



Cory
2019-0215

Cory Diary : Using End Date for XIRR for Annual Returns

Have been constantly seeing usage of Annual XIRR with current date. This is quite "misleading" as it will provides explosive growth for positive returns of portfolio in the early part of the year.

For my portfolio for using current date for XIRR YTD will be 57% for 2019. This is quite shocking number considering my absolute YTD returns are just over 5.6%.

To provide a more balance picture, using XIRR End Date 31 Dec 2019, my XIRR YTD will be 5.8% which reflects closely to the absolute YTD returns of 5.6%.



Cheers

Cory
2019-0215

Cory Diary : NetLink NBN Trust Q3 is out !

Have been keenly anticipating for this quarterly report. Here's the interesting part for the same News by Shentonwire and BT respectively..

SW : NetLink NBN Trust reports fiscal 3Q net profit of S$19.6 million, above IPO forecasts

BT : NetLink NBN Trust Q3 net profit down by 9.4% as costs mount


One is as expected due to investments. The other see it negatively as rising costs.
Who is right ?

We can confirm at the end of tomorrow's trading day for market sentiment but long term I support SW report of-course (vested).


Cory
2019-0213

Cory Diary : Diminishing Power of Dividend Play

Like any business, leverage allows us to increase our income provided what we earned is more than the cost we borrowed. However this is subjected to lender conditions. When the bank refused to lend you more (weakness), this tell something. If you could borrow cheaper than what the bank willingness to lend you, this says something too (strength).

For a start, for non-believable of Reits ... read  Here . Over the years, stable and strong REITS have registered significant capital gains on top of dividends. This started with multiple QEs follow by tapering and rising rates. This also resulted Reits getting more expensive. Let's take one of my favorite REIT Capitamall Tr (CMT). 

I have blogged countless time why I invested in CMT. Below 3 of my earliest articles.

Cory Diary : CAPITALAND MALL TRUST 4Q16

Cory Diary : CAPITALAND MALL TRUST 1Q17 ( CMT )

Cory Diary : CAPITALAND MALL TRUST 2Q17 ( CMT )

Each time with increasing Stock Price, the yields get lower. Now, with current 5% yield would we buy ? Before we able to answer this we need to consider a few points.

1. Singapore economy has been performing relatively well. We have strong currency and unemployment is relatively low. Cash get accumulated in saving banks.

2. Property curbs have driven away many investors

3. Interests rate despite increasing is still a low rate.

4. Singapore Saving Bond = 2.5% ( 10 yrs ) capped by recent ceiling of 200k.

5. World is on low growth path

This implied there is a large reservoir of cash seeking for opportunities that can beat SSB dividends and long term dividend returns and growth will be bonus. This money aren't expecting Best World type of stocks for those who do, many fails. Which non-REIT stocks can beat CMT on that ? 

Now to the last comment for our thought. With lowering yield in CMT. Would we buy. This is back to the fear of anchoring that one should avoid. With 5% yield, how many options out there that can give us relatively safe and constant 5% dividends with some growth ?

Final note, this need not be CMT. It can be Ascendas. It can be Maple family. But a well managed Reits take out a big chunk from public listed company mindset of owner that "This entire company is mine mentality".

So did we see a peak in Reits recently ? Your guess is as good as mine. But long term, whatever fluctuation in prices, your dividends will catch up to cover. The important point is, how long. 

Got your answer ?


Cheers

Cory
2019-0209

Cory Diary : Net Worth 20190205

Net Worth

The last time I blogged about Net Worth is in 2018 May. (see link). It  has since increased by about 5.3% to date. A hint of size, my equity net worth just crossed a hallmark with recent market run up in Jan'19. My last year dividend is roughly 47k. For definition on Net Worth to me, read #1 and read #2. Basically in essence is net present value if I am to sell off everything including my home and adding Pension/CPF to it since I could not sell them.

Saving

I thought of reducing my saving but interestingly it went up significantly to 16% which kind of a surprise me. Maybe few percentage due to recent share sales.( updated: Good bonus from last year, baby cost me probably 20k ). My goal is to reduce it as mentioned earlier (read here ) ... but ..execution is a problem as I don't go by target number forcibly. The investment injection is about 4.9% which pretty align to Net Worth 5.3% growth. Another possible reason is because of hit on ceiling in my SSB contribution, and with the increase of limits to 200k, I could do some improvement this year.

Insurance

With the amount of cash in hand, there is no strong reason to surrender Insurance policy. I would just let my endowment continue to roll. I have not think much about my Life Policy as well but I guess it will be in  procrastination mode for the better.


Why am I doing this on first day of CNY ? ... Enjoying my Babysitting experience ... ... ...
Happy Chinese New Year !

Cheers

Cory 2019-0205

Cory Diary : Liquid Asset 2019-0202

Equity takes up 50% of my liquid asset. With Bond/Pref, that will be 59%. If I am to add Gov securities, that's 68%. This group is making money to work category.

I was working on the above points and then realize is really a bad plan to lower my saving by 12 points for much higher equity allocation. Is inward looking of personal finance furthermore I am already vested with 50% Equity. Prefer good buffer for emergency, housing and family so I aren't putting them to risk.

Maybe growing the equity pie by 10% will helps. That will boost (updated for privacy) dividend after 2019 and will takes 3 years of good market to achieve. If I am to do some income injection and some modest capital adjustments of the 21% Cash saving, probably 2 years. That's sound more forward looking.

And if the market goes bad. Wait it out ...


Cory

2019-0202