Cory Diary : Sheng Siong 4Q'2016

Is another profitable period for Sheng Siong. A growth and relative good dividend stock. The Rev/Profit growth is so persistent that every quarter seems like a norm. What I like most is it provides basic essentials therefore relatively recession proof. A mix of growth and yield stock, how much growth imo depends on how fast it can expands and idle cash available to support the expansion considering profit is mainly distributed out.

Sheng Siong 4Q'16

This is cut and paste Key Notes

Dividends
"Propose a final cash dividend of 1.85 cents per share, taking our total dividend for FY2016 to 3.75 cents per share, equivalent to about 89.9% payout on our net profit after tax." That's roughly 4% yield.

Growth
"The Group is still looking for suitable retail space particularly in areas where the Group does not have a presence. However, competition for retail space has not abated and looking for suitable retail outlets may be challenging." There is still enough cash to expand for growth.

Risk
"The Verge and Woodlands Checkpoint supermarkets which were to close on 30 April
and 30 June 2017 respectively as the landlords will be re-developing the sites have now been extended to 31 May and 31 August 2017. These supermarkets contributed 8.6% to FY2016’s revenue."

Without looking into details, appears mitigated by staggered closure, continue store growth and existing sales growth.


Cory
20170223

Cory Diary : LMIR TRUST Report Q4 2016

LIPPO MALLS INDONESIA RETAIL TRUST

DPU 0.87 ( 7.4% increase )

For Stock Price of $0.385, Yield about 9%

Gearing : 31.5%

I like this REIT because of good Indonesian population base growth potential, income outside Singapore with mid term track record. Base on this quarter result, likely next few quarters we will see better rental revision thus potential growth in DPU.

DPU Track Record

The down side is interest rate, mitigated with 70% fixed rate basis. Forex is ok with weaker Singapore dollars. Is this a rare REIT gem ?

Cory

20170216

Cory Diary : REITs Investment

Reits have been in my portfolio for many years. Each year I learn "New Tricks" and pay some school fees. Instead of going through the learning pains, I like to document down what to look for and appears it can be boiled down to 4 pillars

Integrity

This is critical. While there maybe time for speculation, this is not my cup of tea. The other three below are more inter-connected.

DPU

The Managers can do share placement, issue rights, increase borrowing but at the end of the day is how much Dividends Distributed per Share/Unit. An increasing DPU is excellent. A stable DPU is ok in exchange for lesser risk.

Yields

Distributed Income/Current Price. If I am happy with the yield, that price is good price to invest.

While I may wait for opportune moment per chart, the timing will not be too long as price correction could be mitigated by dividend distributed. 

Capital Gains

Chances of higher stock price in the future requires active management of smart managers. This create a forward buffer for my investment. Capital gains should be accorded same recognition as initial amount invested. Money is money regardless gains are capital or not.

Cory

20170202

Cory Diary : CAPITALAND MALL TRUST 4Q16

Investing in CMT is one of a kind. It can hardly go wrong  if you have taken a peek on it's portfolio of assets. The issue with it will be the actual return after stock price fluctuation. And so investing in CMT is more important in the entry price and the yield Maths will work itself out.

The quarter annualized DPU is 11.46 cents. Yield about 5.92%. This is despite Funan undergoing redevelopment. Management has stated moving forward to focus sustainability of the DPU. I guess that will be the benchmark.

Assuming Stock market tank, the maximum capital loss price will be around $1.82 after dividend will result in 6.1% yield assuming dividend able to maintain. Will you buy more or hold or sell ? This logic is important because stock price can continue to go lower to $1.7 as a test case. That will be about 23 cents loss or more than -11%. However Yield will go up to around 6.5%. If CMT fundamental is solid, do stock price matter for a dividend player mid to long term ? In fact for a million dollar asset invested, you will get 65K which some will be elated instead of just 58K currently.

What will the stock price and yield be after the funan site has re-developed complete ?


Cory
20170128


Notes:

"CMT’s current portfolio comprises 16 shopping malls which are strategically located in the suburban areas and downtown core of Singapore 

- Tampines Mall, Junction 8, Funan (formerly known as Funan DigitaLife Mall), IMM Building (“IMM”), Plaza Singapura, Bugis Junction, Sembawang Shopping Centre, JCube, a 40.0% stake in Raffles City Singapore (“RCS”) held through RCS Trust, Lot One Shoppers’ Mall, 90 out of 91 strata lots in Bukit Panjang Plaza, The Atrium@Orchard, Clarke Quay, Bugis+, a 30.0% stake in Westgate held through Infinity Mall Trust (“IMT”) and Bedok Mall held through Brilliance Mall Trust (“BMT”)."

"CMT owns approximately 14.1% interest in CRCT, the first China shopping mall REIT listed on the SGX-ST in December 2006.'

Cory Diary : 2017 Chicken Out

Did my second speculative trade of the year for fun. This is after I notice there is still some upside for Keppel since last year low. By the way I am no fan of Oil and Gas or Ships. And no margins. Saw my profit went up to more than $800 before it came crashing down after the poor result announced. This hit me back to fundamental reality or am I ?

Nevertheless I Chicken Out and close my positions with some Ang Pao money for the year.

The XIRR is 82% because I achieved $382 profits within the month - short period. If I am able to continuous perform of similar periods to full year, it would have been 82% returns of my investment. This would also mean keppel stock price will have to jump by similar amount from my entry position which is unlikely to happen.

Understanding another way, the actual return is 3.2% for less than a month effort. For same performance throughout the year, this will be 82% due to investment compounding of the 3.2%
.

Cory
20170128

Cory Diary : Frasers Centrepoint Trust 1c17

I actually blogged a lot on FCT. My poor memory was thinking it was a year ago. (Corrected)

Key Takeaway

NAV $1.93. Last closing share price is $1.965. Slightly above book value. Management has said they will maintain 100% payout of roughly 5.9% yield.

The AEI trough expects in May'17 and recover after. AEI completion in Sept'17. Expecting possible further few percentage reduction in NPI in the next report.

Gearing at 29.7% and the weighted average debt maturity was 2.6 years. The all-in average cost of borrowings in 1Q17 was 2.1%. FCT has approximately 56% of its borrowings on fixed or hedged-to-fixed interest rates. Good !

There is potential of lower share price for 1st half of 2017 but I believe the dividends will be able to cover more than it. And with the potential boost in future DPU in the 2nd half of 2017, this maybe a relatively attractive stock to own.


Cory
20170122

Cory Diary : Financial Updates 20170121

How I will approach this is to have my Financial Charts up for evaluation. This data is computed automatically through excel. So theoretically I am able to produce them everyday with little effort.

The first chart is my Net Worth. I have this tracked since 2007 to see the Market crash horribly the next year. Unfortunately this is the furthermost that I have tracked as I would like to have data for another decade more. I find this chart fascinating because I am curious how net worth chart looks like in data over a long period. There is more than 9 years worth of data.

This year I added RED line to truly measure my Net Worth which include my Pension, CPF, Insurance Values and CPF Shares. I have the $ scale removed as usual for privacy.

There is a slight divergence to my surprise between the lines. Does this mean my "locked Investment" is doing better in growth than my investable assets.

The other chart below is asset allocation. Net Property means Value after deducting outstanding loan.
I am still not investing enough. Feel rather bad myself so I may have to reduce it down to 30% this year. And if Market allows to 26% cash and FD.

Cash Buffer for property payment in SG Bank is over 6 years.  This may continue to go up if I stay employed as I am a Value Saver. I plan to maintain this high level of buffer.

Investment wise, 14% in Structured Returns lowers my overall portfolio returns. I hope to expand my Stock Equity if market allowed, by 6% allocation more to achieve better yield..

I am not doing much with CPF other than shifting enough into SA account to earn higher interest rates. The remaining OA CPF to further backup my housing loan. Overall, as you can see I am rather conservative in my financial but I am happy because I could be worst.

If you notice something striking or concern, feel free to comment.


Cory
20170121

Cory Diary : Value Spending

Since young there is not much money to spend. Will always use up my allowance on titbits, pencils, rubbers, meals etc. Looking back, there is not much to save anyway and spending what given is a kind of natural thing to do. In my mindset allowance given is for me to spend and my parents are really good at it on how much I really need on food, bus fare and some extras. So I could say in my childhood I have no concept about saving.

Upon adolescent, this comes to me naturally about spending what I have but there is no crave for things beyond my allowances given. I have never ask for increase to spend or buy something. Life to me is simple. Just spend what given. And it becomes a mental routine. Looking back at it, is quite amazing that I have never thought of how to increase my money or crave for things beyond. That's the "Nerd'iness" in me I guess.

When I started working, saving just grew by "itself". Often I took Taxi as needed, provide allowance to my parents and "toys" I need. Being on time for work is important and I am exchanging time with money. Parents are important to me and allowance is a naturally thing I have to do. To re-charge myself i indulge in personal interests. Every month there be some money left to build up on. Interestingly there is still no deliberate attempt to save. There is one important aspect though is that my overall expenses never exceeds what I had earn monthly. When time comes for marriage, housing, renovation and holidays there are no lack of money because my requirements are not high in the first place. And it occur to me as I grow older that I look for Value and Need. For example when I shop for aircon, there are different pricing and capability, and I will look for higher end key feature at the lower cost of what is available. Not the cheapest. There is no brand stigma. Samsung is one of them.

When I started to learn to buy stocks, I started with playing warrant shares because there is an affiliation on their ticks and  the savings required are not much but you must have some. Frankly my broker is more nervous than me when I allowed one stock to expire. She almost screamed at me. That's just $1500 many many year ago. No small sum and it doesn't strike me as an issue either. I made $10, 000 in my first few trades just based on a few investment logic. She is still my broker today and she is not complaining any more.

Till today this continues in my purchase of stocks for Value. Yes I have much more money today because I focus primarily on my work but expenses are still kept quite low level. More than 50% of my annual income are saved each year. Is not that I like to hoard the cash, is just that I do not know how to spend them all needlessly. There is no dedicate effort to save. Income just grow with the job which I focused on doing well. And with investment income taking off,  this really helps to put my financial in really good shape.


Cory
20170112

Cory Diary : Summary of 2016

We have Trump elected and Stock up. Continuing Oil crisis but a pickup of the Banking sector. Survived a retrenchment exercise and have a larger team. We have a shock during Bre-EXIT but market climbed back quickly erasing all the losses. Oil Price moves above $50 due to OPEC Agreement. We have weaken Gold Price of $1159. S$ weakened to support internal factors which is really good news at current scenario for Singapore.

Every year I have an investment plan for next. This year is different. I have yet thought through.
I need to read and travel more to think about it I guess :)

On Personal front for 2016,

Dividends Income
Dividends Income hits as expected. (updated for privacy)

Bonds
This year also mark my first foray into SSB of roughly 2% effective returns. This does lower my overall investment yield but gives a broader income base to complement my fixed deposits and loan repayment redundancy needs. For now, this works well as long as I am working.

Equity
XIRR is 4.3% which is lower than my earlier months mainly due to lower share price in a number of blue chips. While this still beats STI negative returns largely I feel my investment can do even better. Nevertheless I did well in avoiding major losses. Notably two of them are Starhub and MTQ.

Salary and Bonus
Nice adjustment this year and a relatively strong bonus. Nothing to shout about but again thankful for what has been given as they don't come free and easy.

Despite all given, what I am most grateful is that my team members are in Good Health and Happy.

Thank you God for all the Blessing.
Happy 2017 !


Cory
20170103

Cory Diary : Sabana Reit

The purpose of this article is to share the danger of the stock market. The game is not fair.

Sabana Shari'ah Compliant Industrial Real Estate Investment Trust


(updated for privacy)  It was darling in the market with it's high yield. I even named it as one of my retirement counter. And then when the master lease issue comes in, I found something a miss.

Started with reducing exposure and then a complete cut loss. From the tip of 1.37 top price, my final cut loss is at 1.055. That's - 22% which is a little late but never late than never. The share price continues to slide down to below $0.50. Losses would have ballooned (updated for privacy)  instead of just $1,442. Never look back again. (updated for privacy)

That's the SHARKS in the market retailer have to be aware. The game is not fair and we need to be on constant vigilant of such as it is worst than casino.


Transaction records below.

Date	Price	Trans	Shares	Trans Value	Comments
28-Dec-12	$1.135	B	30,000	($34,158)
9-Jan-13	$1.155	B	10,000	($11,587)
18-Jan-13	$1.160	B	20,000	($23,274)
23-Jan-13	-	D	-	$1,446	Dividend
1-Apr-13	$1.275	S	20,000	$25,419	Quick trade
23-Apr-13	-	D	-	$964	Dividend
28-May-13	$1.310	B	7,000	($9,201)
30-May-13	$1.240	B	7,000	($8,711)
31-May-13	$1.225	B	16,000	($19,662)
3-Jun-13	$1.215	B	10,000	($12,189)
14-Jun-13	$1.140	B	5,000	($5,730)
19-Jun-13	$1.190	S	7,000	$8,299	Quick trade
23-Jul-13	-	D	-	$1,872	Dividend
19-Sep-13	-	D	-	$1,716	Dividend
23-Oct-13	-	D	-	$140	Dividend
22-Nov-13	$1.085	S	28,000	$30,283	Reduce Exposure
27-Nov-13	$1.090	S	10,000	$10,865	Reduce Exposure
23-Jan-14	$1.055	S	40,000	$42,066	Cut Loss
				($1,442)	Loss include Trans Cost

 Will I trust the management again ? Will you ?

Hard Earn Money leh ...

Cory

20161222

Cory : Singtel

Realistically speaking I agree with Singtel that there is no need for 4th Telco in SG. The reason is pretty straight forward. Neither M1 nor Starhub are credible competitors to Singtel. So what makes us think an addition of 4th or even 5th will helps bring competition to the table ?

If Singtel want to gobble up the whole SG market, they actually can if we truly believe in free market logic. Singtel wouldn't unless they prepare to face the wreath of the regulator and residence. Their strategy will be such as to secure just enough market share while the rest fight among themselves for the remainder. And that's what will happen when the 4th comes in. Which is why the scenario is so bad for M1 and Starhub.

The market will then reach a new equilibrium, and rates will then slowly returns to norm. They can do a 5th or 6th ... it doesn't really matter to Singtel being a regional wide telco.

The above Logic make sense till TPG comes in later into the game. Having a strong FCF in the Australia Market, this pose a serious challenge to Singtel domination in Singapore. I can sense the Singtel CEO no longer smiling as she may have to battle TPG in both fronts. Nevertheless Singtel is still a huge force to reckon with considering TPG FCF could also be significantly dented if Optus do something.

One thing for sure, the journey is not going to be fun for M1 and Starhub.


Cory
20161219

Cory Diary : Work Performance 2016

FY 2016 is another challenging year. Investment can be in Equity but it can be in Work too. The later rewards are more sustaining and bulk of most people income. And the achievement is mentally fulfilling.

After surviving the last retrenchment exercise, I have to bring over another team into my fold who just lose their manager. There are few things in my mind.

Prevent attrition (knowledge loss) in the new team and Business continuity

The risk is real because I have seen entire group turn over with new management change. This can bring serious trouble to the organization and set back the team experience a decade and process broken.

One of my first task is to make sure I do not favor my existing over the new. In fact I went overboard to give them much more attention. I changed my management style to be more easy going and fun. I will talk to them about Pokemon Go and Fallout Shelter. Both are great games by the way.

When come to difficult conversation with employees, I put things in the right perspective and direction on the poor performers without stressing them mentally while achieving business goals. And when dealing with my new team i have all my cards open.

I initiated a separate weekly meeting to handhold the new team on every issue. And provide guidance and discussion. Politics smoked out. Trust driven in.  A+ for that.

Cross Training within teams to support process alignment and efficiency

Not only I have greater responsibility but I have to deal with a smaller combined team strength by 25%. The only recourse is to drive for process alignment and simplification.

And to do it in the short time, I depends greatly on my existing senior employees to train and guide the new team members. They helped me a lot but this also drive some mistrust and ego with the new members later. I have to slowly phased the helps out once we have achieved the necessary goals. Is a B- ...

Continue the success of my existing team

At the same time the existing team bandwidth were tighten due to it and needing others members to step up and ensure performance continuity. One of my key employee left the team for career advancement which I am happy for her but she also left a hole behind to be filled. I have been working with each of my team member on their development and experiences continuously. Happy to say at the critical juncture everyone step-up to do their best especially those whom I have never expected.  This is an A.

For all of that, I am rewarded with a small adjustment and better bonus this year. There will be people glaring at this but this is not the top most in my mind. It was the RECOGNITION statements that i have been given on what my team have achieved that I feel is important. And that's how my FY 2016 ended.

I am honored to have this team. All my investment in them paid off. My wish for FY2017 is I can play a part for the team the same.

Cory

20161215

Cory Diary : When higher Dividend has a Price

Just when I thought 2016 will be the year my Dividend will finally dipped since embarking on dividend strategy, year-to-date I have hit another all time high (updated for privacy) . So what happened ?

Thanks, but not thanks, due to "anticipated" Neretal special dividend of 15 cents but with more than 20 cents dent to the Share price after ... a heavy price to pay for indeed if you are someone who has been tracking this counter. Is definitely not a Saizen. And I am not pleased.

If anyone think that dividend strategy does not work locally, think again. (updated for privacy).

Will I be able to maintain this new level of dividend next year ? Probably considering my portfolio is still not optimise. Still some work to do. Another is the high cash level which I have been deliberating on to use. Quite an amount in foreign currency which has hedge S$ currency weakness.

Good news for this two weeks will be my income currency has appreciated 8% relative to Singapore dollars. The bad news is that the rate is dynamic and many of my assets are Singapore dollar denominated including loans.But then interests rate is moving up. And my portfolio is muted towards the Trump Rally to my dismay. One good thing out of it is that our labour cost reduced by 8%. And property in relative terms has become cheaper by 8% too. This is really good for Singapore reeling from high cost of labours and property prices.

Talking about interests rate. Reits got skinned recently and I dipped for some. So glad to be back in the 6%-10% yield range. In the Telco front is a slaughter.I have avoided Starhub and M1 specifically for the past year. Singtel I feel is ok because whatever go down likely will come back up. It is more sentiment for a diversified and strong counter. Will there be special dividend after coming one ? oh no ...hope not another Neratel. There has been huge outflow of money from developing world back to America pushing the DJIA to another high. I would be prepared for the tide returning.

What's more ?

Busy weeks on travel. America is still a land of plenty, and waste. Consumer market rule.
Salary and Bonus assessment period. :)

Cory
20161125

Cory Diary : Global Warming

This has been one of most contentious. Global temperature has been rising. Does not using coal helps ? Should we use Nuclear energy ? Will the damage be reversible especially our oceans ? Is Oil the problem and the solution ? Save the Earth helps ? Cutting down electrical usage helps or just prolong the issue ?

Cory believes is plainly due to human population growth. From google ...

"What is human population growth?


Global human population growth amounts to around 75 million annually, or 1.1% per year. The global population has grown from 1 billion in 1800 to 7 billion in 2012. It is expected to keep growing, where estimates have put the total population at 8.4 billion by mid-2030, and 9.6 billion by mid-2050."


Ding Ding is Human Population. That's it. There is simply more increase in the rate of energy dissipation into the environment thus higher temperature we felt and measured. However daily total energy get emitted into space, which is why we need the SUN to keeps Earth alive. The dissipation of waste energy is so efficient that in total none is left over time on what we received else we will be roasted in no time. Trust me !

So is this rising temperature going to stop ? Not with increasing population but it does get mitigated with better efficiency in the equipment we use. There maybe to a point where human population tapered/decrease largely in poorer countries en-mass due to heat thus indirectly controlling the population rise. Developed countries which use a lot of the power ie. air-con, computers, lights, TVs, Fridge, Washing Machine, Hair dryer, Iron ...  are basically self-contained due to decrease in birth rate anyway.

Ok ! Before environmentalist starts to "Flame me", I share no joy in increasing temperature. And cutting down power usage helps a little but frankly is really little. Human population jumps 840% in 2 centuries. The answer is right in our face, we just need to manage our population better. We are wasting too much time and money in other directions to contain the Heat. Is a natural Earth cap.

Short term of our lives, Human Interested Consumption will do well such as property and food.
Excitements that gives joys to our life will do well too.

In my dream. Maybe we should invest in Stock that leads us to our Universe. Keppel and SBI stocks will rocket like our population growth. Inter-galactic Space Shuttle program anyone or should we get down to earth ? Singapore Dome ? 400 men crews Aircraft Carrier ? 


Cory
20161123

Cory Diary : Forest Woods

Almost 70% (357) units of Forest wood Residence (OCR) has been lodged with URA website. Price range between S$1300~1500 psf sitting on site area of 150,712 sq ft.

When North Park Residence first launched, it was a success too. Both private condos are in prime locations and 12F. I remembered complaining how small the units and felt this will only get smaller considering TDSR limiting the affordability and Land Pricing. So how this been going after more than a year ? Using site area to compute ...

Forest Woods : 150,712 sq ft / 519 units = 290 sq ft / unit
North Park Residence : 442,234 sq ft /  920 units = 480 sq ft / unit

Forest Woods has smaller land mass than North Park Residence by almost 40% ! This is despite North Park Residence has 920 units. So by population density measure we are going to see more people around the blocks.

Will the smaller trend continues ?


Cory
20161024

Cory Diary : Astronomical Returns

I have been seeing astronomical returns from some forum recently. It easily get people attention. That's what it does. But what's matter at the end of the day is how much you truly made at specific time frame. Why I say that is because market goes up and down. And relative performance measures need to account for time frame with reasonable period length to allow for stability.

STI Index

STI with Dividends from 2009-2016 = 9% annual returns after cost.

Let's take a peak of some period after global financial crisis (GFC) based on STI. Since is reasonable not to choose the bottom. At a height of STI 1900 on May 2009 will be something i am comfortable with. The current STI Index is at 2800. The XIRR ( Annualised returns ) excluding dividends are 5.3%. If we are to include dividends that will be like 8~9%. That's like 7 years after GFC.

Percentage can be quite misleading as it is open to abuse with time, value weight-age and cost structure. There is also price spread which can cause a large dent and trustworthiness. So to ball park a figure, if we are to put $100,000 into a fund 7 years ago just using 5.3% annual return figure, your value should be around $147,000 excluding "dividends", and we are taking the lowered STI price of today. Meaning 47% profit is the Minimum Expectation.

Hello ! you have to have 47% profit at that specific time frame because that is what all investors should have as a baseline. And I have even excludes dividends. So are you getting this amount in total else is time you question your judgement.

Cory

20161016

Cory Diary : XIRR Performance - Q3 2016

The Market comes down a little on the last day of Sept. For the past few quarters I have been enjoying the bliss of cutting loss quicker and holding bull stocks longer. This is a rather fundamental change in my mental decision which takes a long time to overcome but necessary. So far, overall I have been right.

Some of my actions I took is to clear LKH to focus on my portfolio better. I bought it this year in the hope there maybe some run up on property. It didn't. A little gain from a small speculative position. Applied for SGS Bond last month due to significant excess cash in the bank and to build up additional buffer on my loan.

The drop in DOW on days before Fed announcement on rates help to push for no rate increase this time.The decision would have been otherwise has the market hit new highs. Is becoming clearer and clearer that they work on market sentiments to avoid crash as is all about market confidence.

Enough said. This time i have compiled previous quarter for comparison. Do note I do not close exactly my performance result for each quarter on the last day except this quarter which happens to be so.

Not much has change except for YTD on Equity. Is not a surprise this measure will decrease with longer time in the year. This is why using performance based on 30 Dec'16 comes into play. I have a slight up in Q3'16. Both XIRR performance will converge on 30 Dec'16. Personally I am quite happy to hit 10% on my enlarged equity portfolio which beats many funds outright.

Outlook to watch

1. Oil Price
2. SG Property Measures
3. China and Indonesia Debts
4. SG Telco Markets
5. Trump Presidential Campaign
6. RMB Weakening

I have also started taking some TA learning and Charting practise to time my entry and exit better on stocks I hope to invest or divest.


Cory
20161002

Cory Diary : Calculating Return in Equity - Part 2

In this continuation of calculating equity return, let's simulate a scenario that on certain years we have very good returns. And we feel rich that during that periods, mentally we think we can afford to lose. This can be at portfolio level or Individual Stock that we have grown to love.

As the table above, I picked year 2009 and 2012 where Cory has strong gains and have them tweaked about 50% lower returns as we are less careful with money and that we have fallen into a tunnel vision of justifying more risk on just one or two stocks which have been been a key lifter of the entire portfolio.

This is not unrealistic. Is quite common we see at portfolio level we are doing well just because of a few of them or maybe even just one counter. And if that one is soured later on, we like to know the impact.

From the table we can see Annualised returns reduced to 4.2%. And for the above example is a $61, 000 hits on return of $100, 000 investment. Do remember return on such over 10 years compounded is quite significant even for just 1% point.

The next time you feel a particular stock has gained 100% return for you that you can afford to lose them back since at counter level you will not lose, better think again.


Have a nice day.

Cory
20160918

Cory Diary : Tray Collection Robot

Smart Tray Return automation piloted in a food court recently. Pretty cool huh. There is some issues here and there. The walkway is too small and the robots are a little sensitives which i think is alright due to safety. Nevertheless I find it interesting. What I do like is we probably have created a number of higher value jobs. Well is still pilot and may not take off. However this may ignite other initiatives here and elsewhere.

I still remember like "yesterday" having a vivid discussion with a respected blogger on old folks hired to help clean up the plates in food courts. His main concern is what type of values he want his children to have. Old people helping to clear his kids dishes ? I respect that. And then we also have the efficiency addition where the government want to rely less on foreign workers, and grass roots promoting self service. Well it is not going anywhere.

Curiously that time in my thought is, did anyone ask about what the old folks think ? I am more empathy that many of this old folks need to work or spending few hours of their time a day trying to earn some pocket money.

This is especially so for those who do not have enough saving. There is limited job alternatives for them. They are one of the social interaction remaining links. What more there is some value creation. There is also some interaction in their life. I think we need to appreciate their service.

But if you ask me now, i would say the tray automation system complement all our needs. The robots will likely complement their work. The workers are still needed, the children can still walk up to put their tray, the robots will lighten the labour needs and we have created higher value work supported by engineers, hr, managers etc.





I come back to Singapore few times a year. Every time i will not miss buying my Business Times copy from this old Indian Lady. A temporarily prop up store. Very friendly. And I would always like to put up a chat with her every time in the morning when I am there. She lights up my morning with her cheerfulness and ideas.

And then another older Chinese lady solo many a time on the Kopi-Tiam noodle store. Excellent food. Shes looks like 70 ! One of my favourite. Irreplaceable cooking skills. Who next's ? They all play a part in our daily life aren't they ? Do we really like to see newspaper vending machine ? Factory produced noodles self-collect at pick-up point ? Maybe some people like talking to "Wall".





Key part of the life equation is how technology enable and complement our daily experiences especially those that are the fabrics of our society. Not just dollar and cents. Maybe our future can be more exciting  in this lacklustre market.

Cory
20160917

Cory Diary : Calculating Return in Equity

When I look across STI Index back 10 years there are 3 major down levels. If your investment have survived this three crisis give yourself 2 STARS.

1. 2008 US - Sub Prime Financial Crisis
2. 2011 European - Greece Crisis
3. 2015 China - Stock Crisis

When we start measuring our performance matters. Anyone who invest right after 2008 bottom will most likely survive well today especially for those who invest big. If you did big please give yourself 2 STARS.

Using $100,000 Investment seed as if I am a Fund Manager, applied to my past 10 years performance. And then compared to two tweaked samples calculation on strong and mediocre performances.

The first table is Cory returns. 10 years Annualised return is 6.7%. I give myself 2 STAR.

The 2nd Table has return tweaked with smaller losses in year 2008 from -52.5% to -25%. And in year 2011 from -13.1% to -8%. This 2 years are periods where market is bad. 10 Years annualised returns boosted to 9.5%. Give yourself 3 STARS if you hit this level of performance.

The 3rd Table has return tweaked to have lower return in other years only. 10 years Annualised returns come down to 2.3%. This is in the upper range of fixed deposits. Still better than cash. 1 STAR.

What I understand from the tables are reducing large looses are important. Consistent performance is even more critical.

How many STARS you have ?


Cory
20160911