Staying Sideline

I have further reduced my stock holdings to negligible levels now. It's difficult to make money from it, and I would like to take a break to review and rethink about what should be my moves to better build up for my personal financials.

With mostly cash now, I'm arranging to pay down my house loans first. Besides this would mainly be earning the interest, do some minor fx operations and monitoring. For now, I would think it will be a quite a while monitoring mode, until I figure out or see some major opportunity that arises.

Staying sideline, staying relevant.



Disclaimer: This post is not a call to buy or sell. Plse do your own analysis and make investment decisions.

Reduced position

I have reduced my positions heavily by around 50%.

This is partially about mkt outlook, and current price levels. It has been long due, I should have done it sometime Oct last year.

Depends on price movements, I should be further reducing it by some. and then goes into monitor mode.

My long term financial objective has revised down also. By having an ambitious goal doesn't help in all scenarios. The path of time is quite fixed and limited.


Disclaimer: This post is not a call to buy or sell. Plse do your own analysis and make investment decisions.

Hello 2019, Bye 2018

The year of 2018 has concluded with a loss of 5.5K for me. I know the market is overall not doing so well, but this result is still quite poor as I have been prudent with fund allocation. 2018 should able cover back for the previous loss but ended up in red again.
The main draw back comes from 2 counters. I would not mention which they are, but they serve a hard lesson to me. Rosy pictures can turn plain, and weak prices can get weaker. No matter what the base is, profit or dividend or asset value, these metrics are not fixed. Seemingly cheap may not be real cheap always, or in future. Stock prices are about future, and they move ahead and fast.
While 2018 has passed, 2019 looks to be another challenging year. Not just stocks, even work life are the same. I'd say this is complex matter, this world, life, human society, economy and everything. Maybe it is just going towards where it should be, hard working is required and fruits need to be farmed and earned.
I would also need to set a right mindset. Invest is a means, it can bear fruits, it can also be damage. by going for it means accepting its nature. and it's not the only thing that matters, there should be focus on things like healthy living, meaningful life, family and children.
Well, I'm still on my course of investing as I'm not quitting the path. I can't say that I'm optimistic or pessimistic on it. It's just that I start to realize investing won't be suitable for everyone and it comes with its inherent risk factors.
I have come to a stage where savings won't help much already. The ideal scenario is that portfolio can self grow and help with my financial free goal. I know investing is an answer; but still, the approach should still be scientific based, i believe more on the compounding miracle. Anyway, won't be so straight forward too.
Wish all the best for the roads ahead. Cheers



Disclaimer: This post is not a call to buy or sell. Plse do your own analysis and make investment decisions.

Investment Platforms

The US market just tumbled before the break day 5-Dec. well it's a separate topic, I'd share about the investment platforms I'm currently using now.

Over past 2-3 years, I have tried many things, SSE A shares, forex, CFD, Foreign stocks, Futures etc.
I have no interest in warrants, or options stuff. These instruments are all inter-linked, esp Forex. Forex is an interesting thing, complicated, manipulated but inevitable.

Unavoidable, I have opened quite a handful accounts with various providers. they all got own characteristics, but to me most importantly is safety to fund.

After all these, I have now downsized all these investment platforms. so here are the few things left for me that I will move on with:
1. CDP (via local brokers)
2. IB
3. OANDA

I figure they should be able to provide the investment services that I need for now, and they are good platforms.
so what platforms are you using, I'd welcome your sharing in comments as well. Thanks for reading.


Disclaimer: This post is not a call to buy or sell. Plse do your own analysis and make investment decisions.

Year 2018 closing soon

This has been a busy year, this has been a fast year. I haven't post anything yet, so yes, here I am, still surviving in the market.

In terms of investment, it has been a tough year. There has been ups and downs. I had some success with Comfort, WBA counters, but really hit bad by some counters like Singpost, QAF. so the year would not be performing so well overall, but one consolation is that USD has strengthened, and that will give some currency gains.

Any lesson learned? ya I figure is that by all means be prudent and don't over commit, because you would never know that a rosy counter would turn out to be a bomb. It could go low, average down is fine, but bear in mind it will go lower.

The real question is, what's the sustainable way to make profits? keep taking or ride the bull for long time? that's something for me to think about. some profit taking had been good moves, but some proved to be not so good. If the overall return is still like this so so, why not just dump everything into a gov savings bond and earn predictable 2.x%?

This year I figure I would be looking at a small loss again or some margin profit. overall not so satisfied but as I said still can survive it. will post it when the year close.

Thanks for reading and all the best with investing!



Disclaimer: This post is not a call to buy or sell. Plse do your own analysis and make investment decisions.

2018 New Start

2017 has passed by so fast. I have stopped the blog for a while too.
It has been a challenging ride for me although stock indexes are moving up a lot. Have to say my plans didn't turn out so well.

The 2nd half of year went from bad to worse, and in the end my accounting tells a small loss for year 2017. Mainly hit by weak USD, and a few counters like SPH, SIA E, Comfort, QAF. Mr Market moved against me and I have to admit the defeat.

2018, my open positions are still standing. and the few days of Jan has been violent moving for the markets. Quick moving might not turn out so well statistically based on history. It's going to be another exciting ride seemingly. Lets hold on to it.


Disclaimer: This post is not a call to buy or sell. Plse do your own analysis and make investment decisions.

July 2017

The month of July has been another challenge. Stock counters under performed and USD went even weaker. The earning has been declining again and the year's outlook become somewhat uncertain. I cannot be sure if it's just a test, and it is a tough test now.


Disclaimer: This post is not a call to buy or sell. Plse do your own analysis and make investment decisions.

Mid of 2017

Just a timely update on this year's track. Recent weak USD and some stock counters under perform has impact the profit. only around 3% overall for the 1st half of year. It's a long journey and would need to see how the 2nd half of 2017 unfolds. Stay tuned.


Disclaimer: This post is not a call to buy or sell. Plse do your own analysis and make investment decisions.

Apr 2017

It's very fast to reach end of Apr month. This has been a good month in general. Though USD had been weak, stocks are doing well. Local shares rose, and US shares also recovering from previous sell down.

It's interesting to see month of May is coming.


Disclaimer: This post is not a call to buy or sell. Plse do your own analysis and make investment decisions.

Mar 2017

Overall Mar has been a plain month. USD went weaker despite of rate hike. Local stocks gained.
The US stocks didn't run up any more in Mar period, which is interesting while the emerging markets start to gain.

For the month of Mar, the overall portfolio gained a small amount. I think this is doing all right. While the focus is on the forthcoming as I would not expect still such a smooth journey ahead..


Disclaimer: This post is not a call to buy or sell. Plse do your own analysis and make investment decisions.