Retirement is a word that invokes fear. The fear of not having enough money to retire. The fear of money running out during retirement. The fear of the retirement age being pushed back even further. The fear of social isolation, losing your identity, health issues and the like. It is no wonder that when “early retirees” are featured in the media, it usually draws the ire of the populace. How exactly have these people “gamed the system”, and are able to escape the rat race?  Ashish Kumar, the 31-year-old retiree Earlier this year, Ashish was featured in multiple media articles and intervi ..read more

  Portfolio allocation as of August '23. • SG Shares: CDG, DBS, Haw Par, SGX, Valuetronics • SG Reits: Syfe Reit+, DigiCore Reit • US Growth: BABA, INMD, PYPL, SHOP, TDOC, UPST • US ETFs: SCHD, QUAL August was a decent month for adding to my existing positions. I bought more of 2800HK amid the China real estate fears, and added to my Syfe Reit+ portfolio multiple times. In my previous posts, I have shared about having an asset allocation target of 50% Singapore, 30% rest of world and 20% China. Recent events have led me to rethink this allocation, thus I have made the following adjustm ..read more

  Portfolio allocation as of July '23. • SG Shares: CDG, DBS, Haw Par, SGX, Valuetronics • SG Reits: Syfe Reit+, DigiCore Reit • US Growth: BABA, INMD, PYPL, SHOP, TDOC, UPST • US ETFs: SCHD, QUAL Markets have been on a frenzy and hence there's little portfolio activity to report for July. Again, the only purchase was my regular DCA for Syfe Reit+.  Just for fun, this is the first time that I've calculated the month-on-month increase in portfolio value. Portfolio at the end of July was +6.9% higher than portfolio at the end of June, excluding inflows during this month. Interesting ..read more

  Last week, there was an article in the Straits Times, titled “Moving from financial stability to financial abundance takes Singaporeans 32.3 years”. As usual, when it comes to the topic of retirement… it caused quite a stir online. Based on social media comments, the overwhelming sentiment seems to be that these numbers are ridiculous – that in Singapore, it is nearly impossible to achieve financial freedom / financial abundance, apart from maybe striking the lottery (or birth lottery).  To summarise what the article mentioned, the survey found that from a starting point of finan ..read more

  Feb 23 Portfolio Update Portfolio allocation as of Feb '23. • SG Shares: CDG, DBS, SGX, Valuetronics • SG Reits: Syfe Reit+ • US Growth: BABA, INMD, PYPL, SHOP, TDOC, UPST Not much to update this month – I mainly added a small amount to my Syfe Reit+ portfolio, as interest rate fears once again puts pressure on S-Reits. This is part of my regular DCA strategy as I work towards accumulating $20k in S-Reits on Syfe. I am clear that my objective is to just achieve market returns for S-Reits and thus will continue to build my position, even though the outlook for Reits may be rocky. A fe ..read more

  This is part 2 of the 4-part series on financial projections for achieving financial freedom. If you’ve not read the first part, I’ll suggest reading that post first and/or watch my YouTube video above (give some support to my first video!), which explains the overall framework for making projections that I’m using to plan my financial freedom journey. Part 1: Using ChatGPT to help with projecting FinancialFreedom numbers Part 2: Sequence of Returns Risk – A Crucial but Often Overlooked Factor The focus of this post is on one important section of the entire planning process – t ..read more

This will be the first of a 4-part series which explains the different concepts covered in the Excel financial freedom template that I have created. I used ChatGPT to help with writing some of the excel formulas and macros. The template allows me to project how much I would need to invest to achieve financial freedom, based on different assumptions on investment returns, volatility, saving rates, inflation and expected salary growth. There are also different scenarios built in to the template, which allows me to account for various market environment, such as stagflation, which has high ..read more

  I want to begin by saying that there’s no “right” or “wrong” investment strategy – we are all investing based on our convictions, our beliefs, our risk appetites, how we perceive data and much more. I am not making a judgement of whether one investment strategy is “better” than another, because ultimately, we are all investing for the same goal – to make money. In recent years, a popular line of thought is to simply invest in the S&P500. In this post, I share my thoughts on this concept, specifically looking at the implications for Singapore-based investors who may choose to pursue ..read more

  A belated update for 2022 as I have been procrastinating, as usual. Wishing everyone a Happy Chinese New Year and may the Year of the Rabbit bring you good health, happiness and wealth. Wealth is placed third, because simply having this without the first two is meaningless.   2022 was largely a good time to deploy capital – being a net purchaser of equities means that I am happier when stocks go down rather than up – giving me opportunities to buy more on the cheap. My invested capital increased by 72% from a year ago (although I had invested more, as this does not account for ca ..read more

Portfolio allocation as of Nov '22. • SG Shares: CDG, DBS, SGX, Valuetronics • SG Reits: Syfe Reit+ • US Growth: BABA, INMD, PYPL, SHOP, TDOC, UPST Not much to update this month. Apart from adding a few hundred dollars to my Syfe Reit+ position, I did not make any additions to the portfolio. I did try to increase my position in Valuetronics at below $0.50, but was unsuccessful. Perhaps better luck in December.  I think it is ironic that there’s strong interest in the markets only when the market is doing well. Take crypto as an example. I’m not a crypto advocate, but a year ago, literal ..read more