August 2026 Updates

August is a good month for income. Dividends received amounted to $2,181.24 consisting of:

SingTel @ $824

DBS @ $615.60

OCBC @ $546.14

CDG @ $195.50

This is higher Y-o-Y and total year dividends look on track to beat last year's figure which was somewhat a mini breakthrough for me. 

No trade done for Singapore portfolio this month. Have been queuing for NLT between $0.97 - $0.975 for the past two weeks without getting filled.

Hence the funds for August have rolled over to add on to September funds.

Just took a quick look at the market and it seems a couple more counters are starting to look interesting in terms of share price.

Hope to be able to deploy the funds soon.

For the US market, one of the short Puts expired unassigned with premium in the pocket.

Wrote another short Put on the same counter and closed it three days later for a quick profit.

Last but not least, added more to my existing ABVX position. 

May 2026 Updates

Received dividend from a number of counters and did a number of transactions as follows.

 

Dividends

 

1) OCBC @ $673.96

2) DBS @ $615.60

3) CIL @ $132

4) CDG @ $229.50

5) Venture @ $250

 

Total: $1,901.06

 

As usual, reinvested the dividends received along with a portion of my side income.

 

Transactions

 

Bought 1,000 units of CICT @ $2.28

 

Bought 2,000 units of Cent Accom REIT @ $1.08

 

Sold 1 x ABVX put @ $99 strike with $5.30 premium

April 2026 Updates

Relatively quiet month for me investment-wise.

Actions include:

1) Wrote another Put on ABVX at $98 strike price, expiring 8th May 2026. Received premium of $2.50.

2) Received DBS dividend of $615.60.

3) Received Ascendas REIT dividend of $558.75.

4) Applied for Ascendas REIT PO allocation + excess. Received full amount of the 1,100 units applied.

5) Added ABVX at $109.02.

Earnings season again. Another disappointing quarter from MIT with overseas assets being the drag. The 8% lower DPU YoY is quite a big drop. 

Another Mapletree unit that is raising alarm bells in me is MLT with their Mumbai acquisition. Many Singaporean companies struggle to do well in the Indian market. Hopefully MLT will be the exception. 

On the flip side, luckily Ascendas REIT's result is not bad overall with their >10% rental reversion.

Portfolio value remains stable.

Fund balance: around $2,200 with incoming dividends expected in May.

Wrapping Up for 2025

Quick wrap up for a year that flew past for me. 

 

Family

This year we went to Bali again for our year end holiday. We stayed 4 nights at the mountainous region of Ubud this time which we really love (last year we stayed entirely at Kuta). Our room opens up to this view:

On the last 2 days we stayed at Kuta to be nearer to the airport. We managed to visit Waterbom Bali this time. I suspect I might just make Bali a yearly visit from now on 🤭.

School work-wise, daughter got an award for Mathematics at the end of school year. Guess it's a good end for her Primary 1.

 

I've never been worried about her school work. It's her stubbornness and temper that I'm concerned with. I seriously think she inherited those from me.

Son's also getting better at being focus at his work. I would like to think his happy-go-lucky character is a blessing.

 

I will be very happy as long as they remain healthy and develop good character. The latter is always my focus when I'm teaching them.

Work

My company remains the main focus. It has been 8 years since I started the business bootstrapped. While it has its ups and downs through the years including surviving Covid, our mission in providing solutions in emission control and protecting our planet never change.

I would consider 2025 a so-so year for the company. While the numbers are not that great compared to past years, the highlights are constant repeat orders from a client - a testament to their trust in us, and a breakthrough into the public sector with a prominent government agency onboard.

I'm looking forward to 2026.

Side line 1:

My side gig as a personal trainer yields better than expected income for 2025. While I was aiming for $20k from this in the beginning of the year, the actual income achieved amounted to $23,640.

 

Not bad considering I only dedicate weekday mornings to this.

This is helped by the signing up of a private client who was introduced to me by her family member who in turn was already training with me.

I find this really fulfilling.

In fact another of his family member contacted me yesterday to enquire about my training schedule.

 

Side line 2:

 

I just embarked on this in October 2025, as an adjunct lecturer in a local IHL. I am only taking two classes per week for now. Income achieved amounted to $2,000.

I'm starting to get the hang of teaching and the administrative work but I must say this side gig is taking too much of my time. Way more than what I expected.

I will most likely continue for the next semester which should be less of a learning curve by then.

CPF

Throughout the year I have made voluntary cash top up to my CPF SA. Total top ups amounted to $5,590. These are taken from the side gig incomes.

In December I also made a transfer from OA to SA to achieve the FRS amount. This is done to take advantage of the higher interest in SA in order to further secure my retirement expenses.

Of course the downside is I have lesser amount to use should I decide to purchase another property in the near future. It is because of this consideration that I have taken so long to make this decision.

Personal Social Responsibility

 

For this year, my choice of causes remain the same: the young, the elderly and the environment.

 

This is just a small gesture to contribute back to the society on a regular basis.

 

Other than this yearly donation habit, part of the reason why I went into adjunct teaching is also to inspire the younger generation. I am teaching the subject of sustainability which is my area of expertise and which is closely related to my work and passion.

If I can motivate more young people to live sustainably and equip them with the knowledge to do so, there is a better chance our future generations can have a decent quality of life.

 

"Sustainability is meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” (Brundtland Commission)

 

Last but not least, my wife and I also donated our household CDC vouchers to Tzu-Chi Foundation (Singapore).

 

Investment

2025 was a mini breakthrough year for me in terms of dividends.

For the first time since tracking, my annual dividends collected crossed the 5 figure mark.

My number of holdings increased to 12 counters. A number not seen since years back.

I invested about $29k in 2025 which is more than the estimated $20k figure foresaw in the beginning of the year. This amount is largely from my side gig incomes. I didn't really touch my savings or main income for investment this year.

Local portfolio value also hit a new high of $235k.

Cumulative dividends since tracking amounted to $62,714.56.

Total portfolio value (SG, HK, US) amounted to $257k.

In December the last batch of dividends came in from SingTel ($656), MIT ($286.20) and MLT ($295.86).

I also bought CapitaLand Invest (CLI) @ 2.61 in December. This feels like a renewed relationship as I have sold this counter few years back when it was still known as CapitaLand.

 

For non-REITS, other than CLI I also bought ComfortDelGro (CDG) and Venture this year. Lastly I also added more DBS and OCBC.

 

For CDG it's another reacquaintance.

 

Best performers in 2025:

 

1) DBS (+131.22%)

2) OCBC (+108.49%)

3) SingTel (+41.90%)

Worst performers in 2025:

1) CLCT (-41.39%)

2) MLT (-5.73%)

3) MIT (-4.89%)

 

CLCT continued to be the worst performer. Same position as last year although there is a slight improvement compared to 2024 (-46.24%).

For the last two years I have tried to divert my portfolio away from REITs by adding other equities. In 2026, I will adopt a more balanced view with a mixture of both asset classes as I feel the worse is over for REITs.

Having said that I will still be prudent with my cash by holding a certain percentage of it due to the present geopolitical risks and the whims of Trump. This will be achieved by only investing from my side incomes while leaving my main income and savings untouched. Same strategy as 2025.

I will probably only deploy the latter income sources if (a) a compelling buy case arises or (b) more clarity on the geopolitical situations arise e.g. concrete end of the wars, step down of office by Trump, etc. However the trick is to remain nimble as is always the case in investing especially so in this era where dynamics change ever so quickly.

For the US / HK portfolio, I will continue to concentrate force on the tech sector since my outlay is relatively small for too many counters. In the US market, I will continue to build a position in MSFT and NVDA. For HK market, I might add more 9988 if it hits $120.

Talking about MSFT, it is the second multi-bagger achieved in this portfolio with a P&L of +179.18%.

Worst performer: PYPL (-68.44%)

November 2025 Updates (Mini Milestone)

Investment

 

Received total dividends of $779.55 from Netlink NBN Trust and DBS in November.

 

NLT: $284.55

DBS: $495

With these, I have hit a mini milestone in my investment. Annual dividend received crossed the $10k mark.

This is not a surprise though as I have anticipated this at the beginning of the year based on the portfolio growth and the expected amount of capital injection I have planned to do for the year.

 

What's nice is there is one more month to go and I am expecting further dividends to come in from MLT, MIT and SingTel in December. This should bump up the total dividends received by another 10% or so.

For this month, I have also added DBS on a dip @ $53.80. This is a huge average up from my existing holding cost of $19.85. The confidence to do this stems from the business performance and management pedigree that I've seen in DBS.

 

With this addition, my average cost now stands at $24.39.

 

I still have about $3k of balanced cash from this month's warchest. Hope to deploy it soon.

Side Gig and Others

 

Started my second side gig as an adjunct lecturer in one of our local IHLs in October.

 

In this month I received my maiden salary from this gig.

 

Income distribution plan is roughly the same as my other gig. 25% of this income goes to my CPF SA. 25% goes to my discretionary spending. 50% goes to my investment pool.

 

For this month I also received the $390 cash from a credit card signup I did in July 2025. Nice bonus towards the end of the year.

 

Surprise Find

 

Was digging through my room to find my birth certificate as my mum wishes to transfer her shares in CDP to me for easier management.

 

However I can't find my birth cert anywhere.

 

Anyone knows what else I can furnish to CDP to prove my relationship to my mum?

 

On the other hand look I've found these surprises during my digging!

 

Posting here for nostalgia sake.

 

Are these worth any money these days?

 

 

 

 

August 2025 Updates

For the month of August, I bought MIT @ $1.99 and Comfortdelgro @ $1.47.

The former is a continuing accumulation to build up my existing position when price dips. With this addition, MIT now occupies 8.75% of the portfolio based on market value.

The latter is a reentry since I sold it 8 years ago. Bought it post XD as the price felt comfortable for a first tranche, dividend yield has become attractive and business fundamentals & outlook are improving.

This month also seen dividends received from

OCBC @ $476.42

DBS @ $495

SingTel @ $800

Total: $1,771.42

Looking forward to next month's dividends. 

Local portfolio value and P&L excluding dividends:

I also transferred $19,999 to DBS fixed deposit with 2.45% interest.

Had a rather unpleasant experience at Punggol Coast Mall Fairprice Finest with my family yesterday.

We were at the 2nd floor doing our shopping and an auntie promoter at the 'Europe' shelving offered my 5 year old a sample.

My son declined as he will always ask me or my wife for permission before accepting things from strangers. 

What irks me is that I heard the promoter told my son to stop looking if he does not want the sample.

After that my son came back to me and I squatted down to ask him what did the promoter said to him. From the corner of my eye I saw the promoter crept up and hid behind one of the shelves near us to eavesdrop on our conversation.

When my son told me the exact words that I heard earlier, I had wanted to go to confront the promoter but my two kids stopped me, saying they are afraid I would be taken away by the police. That gave me a chuckle.

Nevertheless I happened to see the Fairprice store manager and feedback to her about the incident.

Her empathy, professionalism and prompt action are exemplary and show why she deserves to be a manager.

Two ladies, two poles apart in behaviour. 

Anyway writing this to let off some steam.

Thanks for reading. 

May 2025 Updates

For the month of May, received dividends from OCBC ($662.34), Venture ($250) and DBS ($495). Total dividends amounted to S$1,407.34.

 

Also added MIT @ $1.93 to my existing holding.

Discretionary income from side hustle and dividends increased month-on-month. Rifle loaded, pending targets to pop up for firing.

 

Portfolio value currently stands at $205,719.98.

 

Cash-wise, currently holding high amount (probably highest in recent times) due to uncertainties in the macro environment.

Jan 2025 Investment Update

Happy Chinese New Year everyone!

3rd day of the new year and it seems like most are not back to work yet. Traffic is smooth throughout the day. For me, I have resumed my work, albeit in a slower manner.

Just to do a quick update for my recent investments which can basically be summed up in the following sentences:

Buy what, what drop. 

Sell what, what rise. 

1) BABA

I cut loss for this counter at 84.78 at the end of last year partly due to their drastic price cutting of Qwen. Have briefly talked about this here.

Then on the first day of CNY they released a new version of Qwen (Qwen 2.5-Max) which supposedly surpasses DeepSeek-V3, GPT-4o and Llama-3.1 in performance.

Share price immediately shot up. At this point of writing, BABA is trading at 101.92 pre-market.

What a difference a month makes. 

2) NVDA

Added this counter at 137.80 one week before CNY. Seeing some decent profits in the first two days.

On the third day, DeepSeek was released. NVDA share price went south. As of now it is still recovering from the twin pressures of Qwen and DeepSeek.

Talk about timing again. 

3) MIT

Added MIT at 2.19 on 24th Jan. Three days later unit price went south. Probably due to worries to their DC assets from DeepSeek release.

4) Venture

Around two weeks ago I identified five stocks as potential investment to reduce my REITs concentration. Subsequently after delving into the respective AR and latest business updates I whittled it down to 2 stocks of which Venture is one of them. 

The company has been doing share buyback recently at 12.98, 12.93, 12.95, 12.56, 12.66 and 12.81.

This caught my notice and I decided to pay closer attention to the price movement. At one point it went below 12.60 but I missed the opportunity. It shot up after that and I decided to add MIT instead (as above).

Subsequently the price dropped below 12.70 earlier this week and I added some  at 12.68 on 27th Jan. I feel this compares well and comfortably against the prices added upon by the company. If they feel those are fair values for them, this leaves me with sufficient margin of safety as well. 

5) In General

I have identified Venture and another counter to diversify away from REITs. However I ventured into Venture first partly because the share price of the other counter is stubbornly resolute and refused to drop to my TP.

Nevertheless I will continue to monitor both and prepare to add when opportunities arise.

Recently Powell has sung a different tune to Trump's order to reduce rates further. The latest signal from Fed was to hold the rates at status quo for now.

This prompted a big rise in the share price of local banks and drop in the price of local-listed REITs in general.

Overall effect on my portfolio is still a net positive. 

Local portfolio value stands at S$182,776.40

Some thoughts that came into mind with the present market situation. 

1. Should I take profit off my DBS and OCBC? The capital gains now are roughly equivalent to 16 to 20 years of dividends. This is an age old question that has come to haunt me again.

2. If the current unit prices of the local-listed REITs are the fair values assigned by the market in this climate of 4.25 to 4.50% interest rates, then these price points could form the basis of my TPs (+/-) moving forward.

Last but not least, Heng Ong Huat Ah! 

Summary of August 2024

Investment

 

$1,455.68 collected in dividends from DBS, OCBC and SingTel.

 

This, together with another good month in terms of my side hustle as a freelance personal trainer means I have a higher investable amount without touching my main income or savings.

Have not added anything in August since share price of the counters I had planned to add has ran up. Will monitor for dips and enter.

Will continue to add into my income portfolio using: 75% of my side income + 100% of dividends received.

Have been doing this on a monthly basis whenever possible and it has worked well so far.

 

On the one hand I get to grow my portfolio and increase my passive income through compounding, on the other I leave my savings which is my safety net, untouched.

Have also opted to take partial scrips for the upcoming Mapletree Logistics Trust distributions in September.

 

Family

Wifey and I have decided to withdraw our son from his nursery school as we have reasons to believe he has been verbally and physically abused at school.

 

Along with the abrupt change in our son's demeanour, we have also personally witnessed an incident which further substantiated our thoughts above.

Have spoken to the school principal about our son's safety and well-being but she claimed that nothing unusual have been caught on CCTV and that's about it.

Will probably bring this up with ECDA.

Business

 

Exciting times for me work-wise. I have signed an MoA with another company to co-develop an innovative solution to solve one of the biggest environmental issues in today's world.

While it is still an early stage, once the prototype is developed and buy-in is received from the authorities, the scale up will be fast. I'm very much looking forward to this.

Summary of May 2024

Collected dividends from OCBC and DBS. 

Syfe portfolio finally turned in a small profit after so many years although it gave up the gains towards end of the month. 

Added 1,700 units of Netlink NBN Trust @ $0.84.

This is my second purchase in recent months and at the same price. 

On my sideline as a personal trainer, this month is the record in terms of income as I took on a number of new clients. 

As usual, 75% of this income stream goes to my portfolio along with any dividends collected for the month. 

Family-wise, the kids have finally gotten better from their cough and phlegm. However the PD has recommended didi to see the specialist as he is exhibiting signs of sleep apnea.

We are now waiting for the appointment date. Hopefully everything turns out fine.

Summary of April 2024

April is a month of mixed feelings in terms of investment.

At the closing today, my CLCT officially lost half of its value with capital loss of 50.35%. No thanks to the double blow of the new asset class performance and Forex effect. 

Silver lining is the dividends collected over the years that help soften the blow.

Will hold on and ride through this while continuing the dividend collections to lessen the blow.

On the other hand, my DBS and OCBC achieved capital gains of ~59% and ~61% respectively. 

Overall portfolio is still staring at 4.52% loss YTD excluding dividends.

For this month I have added 1,100 units of Ascendas Reit @ $2.66.

Will continue my strategy of making monthly purchase whenever possible.

On the US side, my BABA is at a loss of ~33%. This is somewhat compensated by my AAPL and MSFT which have gains of ~38% and ~59% respectively.

TLDR version: position sizing is important.

On the work front, it is a busy period for me this month with project executions and plenty of paperwork such as quotations to be done.

On my sideline as a personal trainer, I am getting more clients onboard as well so moving forward this income stream is expected to be more significant. 

All in all, fulfilling at work. 

Family time is still my most treasured component. Top all the above to be frank.

Kids are getting fine though their cough has been ongoing for about a month already which is starting to make me worry.

Didi just gave wifey and I a pleasant surprise on Sunday. 

I have just finished ordering our meals with the waiter when Didi suddenly tapped the waiter uncle's hand and said: "and a french fries too".

Both wifey and I laughed instantly. 

When the dishes are served subsequently sans the fries, Didi actually told the waiter uncle "the french fries please".

What a joy to hear that. That initiative to place his order and subsequently reminded the waiter of his order all on his own accord, is incredible to me because Didi is only 3 years old. 

I hope both he and his sister grow up healthy and happy. 

Aug 2022 Updates

August 2022

 

Local Portfolio Value after market close (excluding USD and HKD)

S$136,406.14

Purchase

 

None

Sold

None

Dividends

 

SingTel: $384

DBS: $216

OCBC: $297.36

 

Total: $897.36 

Short-Term Transactions

  

Sold 4 x SE 220826 Calls at $105 strike with $1.26 premium. Closed early at $0.04.  

 

Summary

SGD portfolio:

  

Nothing added or sold. Continue to wait for dividends to come in.

Syfe Core Growth portfolio:

 

Current TWR at -7.52%.

Not adding anymore funds to it.

USD / HKD portfolio: 

 

Made a net profit of US$477.58 (~S$668.26) from my call options in SE this month.

 

Have been writing calls since May till now. Will probably continue to do so.

 

Personal:

 

I have started the side gig which I mentioned last month. So far did 9 sessions which will yield me about $340. Not bad for a two weeks period.

 

I have also started my part time Masters programme at NUS. So far so good though assignments have been assigned which means less free time for me.

May 2022 Updates

May 2022

 

Local Portfolio Value after market close (excluding USD and HKD)

S$134,505.84

Purchase

 

None

Sold

None

Dividends

 

DBS @ $216

OCBC @ $297.36

 

Total: $513.36

Short-Term Transactions

  

Sold 4 x SE Call 220520 at $110 strike with $0.79 premium. Expired.

 

Sold 3 x SE Call 220527 at $90 strike with $0.14 premium. Expired.

 

Sold 1 x Futu Call 220527 at $37 strike with $0.73 premium. Closed early at $0.11.

 

2 x Didi Call 220520 at $10 strike with $0.17 premium expired.

 

Summary

SGD portfolio:

  

Portfolio value went down by about $7K in line with the market. 

 

No new transaction for this portfolio.

Syfe Core Growth portfolio:

 

Will probably close this experimental portfolio when the value recovers. It has not been as resilient as I would like it to be.

 

A bear market is a good way to see a portfolio manager's performance. In this case Syfe Core Growth has not met my expectations.

Current TWR at -5.56%.

USD / HKD portfolio: 

 

Did not make any transaction in terms of outright shares. Made use of the volatility and sold some call options to earn some pocket money for the month instead.

 

Overall profit of US$433.82 (~S$596.73) in options this month.