Shortly after I wrote that we could buy Irish domiciled corporate bond ETF that has a fixed maturity half a year ago, I decided to buy a distribution class of the iBonds that will mature in 2028 to see how the dividends behave. Although there is a dual taxation treaty between the US and Ireland, there should not be any withholding tax on dividends from government Treasury bonds. Since ID28 or the iShares iBonds Dec 2028 Term $ Corp UCITS ETF owns a portfolio of corporate bonds instead of government bonds, I am not so sure about the underlying tax treatment. There is a recent distribution and ..read more

My co-worker shared with me a 2023 Morningstar Investor Returns Around the World report. This report should rename how investors often invest exactly at the wrong time. The Mind the Gap report measures the investors’ returns against the performance of the fund or ETF. This is the more international edition. If you are interested, you can fill in your details and get the report here. Here is some information about the methodology used by the Morningstar team: Morningstar (MS) measures based on total returns (capital gains + dividends) published by funds on their factsheets and website. They me ..read more

Seven and a half years ago, I let readers into my world of meal prep. We basically meal prep what we eat later in the day, the week or the month in a few batches. In this way, we are able to control what we eat and save time. My old post was really comprehensive, and many have feedback that the detail allows them to contrast against their cook or reduce the mental challenge of starting. You can read the post here: Frugal Life: How do I Meal Prep for 7 Days Lunch in Half a Day in Singapore That article was written so long ago. Almost a year before my mom passed away. I thought it was time to up ..read more

JPMorgan came up with a nice slide deck showcasing their data collection about things related to retirement planning. If you are interested in planning for your own retirement, this slide deck might interest you. I reviewed this slide because I am interested in this area for myself and for work. I picked out some of the slides that I find interesting or resonated with me. This slide resonated with me because I think many think that if they can get one or two things right then they can have the kind of retirement they want. It may not be one or two things but a breadth of areas. The challenge ..read more

In BlackRock Chairman and CEO Larry Fink’s 2024 letter to shareholders, he highlighted potentially countries took a peep at the U.S. and wonders what they can do to make themselves more resilient. And the key may be to have stronger capital markets: Last year, I spent a lot of days on the road, logging visits to 17 different countries. I met with clients and employees. I also met with many policymakers and heads of state, and during those meetings, the most frequent conversation I had was about the capital markets. More and more countries recognize the power of American capital markets a ..read more

In this post, I will explain further about the main portfolio which makes up the majority of my net wealth. The bulk of this portfolio was published on Investment Moats for quite a while because I wanted a way to show people how to use my FREE Google Spreadsheet, which many have said is a pretty good way to track your portfolio by transactions ( You can read more and get the spreadsheet here). However, many have also explained that my spreadsheet looks like a zoo. This is because the spreadsheet is not just about tracking what we currently have but what we used to have. So many of the line ite ..read more

About a month ago, I reflected upon the short-term underperformance of a Nikko Shenton fund in Dealing with Short-Term Underperformance is Tough. Reflecting on Nikko Shenton Global Opportunities Merger. I went through my thought process and explained why I think investors through CPF OA may not have a choice but to switch to another fund now that Nikko Shenton Global Opportunities is going to be merged with Nikko’s Global Equity Fund. Since then, Nikko AM has reached out to me and tried to understand what I was thinking and provide some clarity over what I presented. Back then, I thought that ..read more

Here is a safe way to save money that you have no idea when you will need to use or your emergency fund. The 10-yr and 1-yr Singapore Savings Bonds rates since the first issue in Oct 2015 The May 2024’s SSB bonds yield an interest rate of 3.06%/yr for the next ten years. You can apply through ATM or Internet Banking via the three banks (UOB, OCBC, DBS) However, if you only hold the SSB bonds for one year, with two semi-annual payments, your interest rate is 2.99%/yr. The one-year SSB yield seems to be heading down, showing a less flat curve. $10,000 will grow to $13,070 in 10 years. The Singap ..read more

By now, many of you would have heard that UOB has reduced the bonus interest rates that you can earn if you bank with them. The revised rates are below: Changes such as this sometimes positively affect us but also could negatively affect us, as in this case. On first inspection, the interest rate that we can earn is reduced. We also observe that if you spend a minimum of $500 on your credit card and credit salary into your UOB account, there may be more interest to earn on an additional $50,000 of your savings. If you spend $500 minimum on your credit card and successfully carried out 3 GIRO ..read more

My colleagues Mike and Eddy wrote this E-book called InsureWell for Smart Accumulators to help enlighten Singaporeans about their insurance protection. You can download the E-book here. You would need to leave your name and email address before you can download. The book was ready some time ago, but I decided to share it here today because, coincidentally, I got some private messages or questions about whether: Are they adequately insured against XXX? Should they get this policy that their adviser recommends to them? How much should they insure against YYYY? Now… these questions came about ..read more