Review of InvestingNote

Was having my shower just now and my thoughts suddenly veered towards the investment journey I have taken so far.

It all started in 1996, 97. I was like a headless fly buying stocks based on volume and monitoring prices on the teletext. Made some money and after that I took a rather long hiatus before restarting my investment journey some years back.

Since restarted I frequent the Stocks, Shares and Indices (SSI) forum in HWZ.

I remember there was once I created a thread about what is causing the price of a stock to move and I suggested could one of the factors be algorithm trading.

Then I kena 'suanned' by this kid (I call him kid because he is in university and relative to my age) who asked me whether the price of pork in markets is controlled by algorithm also.

That was some unconstructive exchange of views in my opinion.

Anyway I still browse the forum for information and the diverse views.

But the title of this post is about my review of InvestingNote. How does that link up?

I was thinking I have written reviews of companies and my portfolio. So I thought why not write a quick personal review on InvestingNote, which is one of the platforms I frequent daily.

InvestingNote is now one of my daily must-go apps for keeping up with the news and on-goings in the financial world.

I enjoy the diverse views and news report shared among the members unselfishly.

Members are what make a forum.

People like Arsenal, Leslie_Shaffer, Hayashi8, SGNews, etc share news reports everyday.

People like Spinning_Top, uncle178, Grandpa Lemon, Sporeshare, opy, Hachiko, Master_GongJiaowei, CoryLogics, lynlynnakamori, jebus, luxcan, layers are some whose posts I enjoyed.

There are many more. I can't state all.

Functionality-wise, I find the app pretty intuitive. It is easy to toggle around. User experience is great.

Reading the posts, writing one, and making an estimate is very easy. If one can use Facebook and online forums, one would have no problem using InvestingNote.

Number and type of functions at this point of writing is fine in my opinion.

All in all it's a good job done by the InvestingNote team. I hope they can ride on the good work so far, continue to innovate and most important keep it free for members to interact.

Lastly I remember in the early days we were able to use our points to redeem rewards. Is that function still available?

Did not really follow this rewards thingy so any enlightenment would be appreciated. Haha.

P.s. This is neither a sponsored post nor a plp post hor..

Wow can't believe I took an hour to write this post..

Cheers and good night everyone.

Taking Stock of 2018

Leaving 2018 and entering 2019, time for a quick roundup of my 2018 and my little wishes for the new year ahead.

Work

This year is my company's 2nd year of operation. 

Results so far are a tremendous improvement over last year in terms of revenue, profits and scale of projects secured.

Although revenue is still about $75,000 shy of the target I set for myself, I have two more months to 'chiong' before end of my financial year. Hopefully I can close the FY even more beautifully.

In terms of business offerings, I have added the Design, Installation and Maintenance of Solar Photovoltaic (PV) system to my products and services recently.

This is actually synergistic to the other portion of my business which is environmental engineering, particularly in pollution control systems.

As I mentioned before, one of my investment guidelines is to ride along with the macro trend.

I believe Solar PV system is the way to move forward especially in a country like Singapore. Hence I made a deliberate effort to take up a course in this field and graduated from it recently.

This also means I have achieved my aim of adding a new capability to the company by this year.

Moving forward, my focus continues to be growing the business and if possible purchase an office space as part of my recurring income plan.

Other Incomes

Previously I have set a target of achieving S$7,832.88 for my side and passive incomes in 2018.

Actual passive income achieved for 2018: S$6,069.08

Actual side income achieved for 2018: S$3,042.86

Result achieved for 2018: S$9,111.94 (Target met)

For 2019 I am going to target another 20% growth in my dividend income as I will probably be drawing down a portion of my portfolio for some expenses.

For the side income in 2019, there is actually a much higher room for growth. I am in the midst of discussing a venture which if materialised, will contribute a significant amount to this category.

However I do not want to count my chickens before they hatch. Hence targets for 2019...

Targeted passive income for 2019: S$7,200

Targeted side income for 2019: S$3,000

Equities and REITs

My holdings as of 31/12/2018:

With the exception of M1, all the counters in my portfolio closed at a lower price this year end compared to last's.

In 2018, I've added another 5,000 shares of CapitaLand, added another 4,000 shares of Netlink Trust and bought 4,000 shares of Mapletree NAC Trust. Total capital injection is $25,820.

Excluding the capital injection, my portfolio value returned -13.7% compared to last year. A loss of more than $15k.

I really ought to read more, learn more and relook into my investment style especially in the technical analysis to time my entries better.

What a humbling experience. It shows how much of a fool I am in the stock market.

In summary,

1) Yield of Portfolio 2018: 4.30%

2) Cumulative Yield of Portfolio: 8.10%

Similarly, wifey's portfolio also dropped in value ($41,431.98) compared to last year ($41,919.78) if capital injection is excluded.

 

Personal

Baby M who arrived on Father's day 2018, never fails to bring a smile to our face. She is making lots of funny sounds and lots of movement nowadays.

Really a different kind of joy.

Our biggest wish is for her to grow up happily and healthily.

I always believe we should not forget to help others if we can.

Though my investment portfolio performed less than admirably, I donated $550 to a selection of charities in 2018. This is on top of my monthly Giro donations to Community Chest and NKF.

Thanks to giving.sg, it is so convenient nowadays to make donations and volunteering.

Last but not least, I wish everyone a happy new year ahead. Good health and good wealth!