April 2022 Updates

Apr 2022

 

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

S$141,679.18

Purchase

 

None

Sold

4,000 units of MNACT

 

Free shares of AAL, SNDL and WISH

Dividends

 

DBS @ $216

Short-Term Transactions

  

Sold 3 x AMD Put 220429 at $85 strike with $0.82 premium. 

 

Closed early at $0.96 for 1 contract.

 

Closed early at $0.65 for 2 contracts.

 

Summary

SGD portfolio:

  

Sold 4,000 units of MNACT at $1.23. Total profit margin including dividends at about 30.6%.

Portfolio value decreased by about $6K after the sale.

 

Looking to add others when suitable opportunities arise. Was eyeing Ascendas Reit and CLCT.

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 -2.34%.

USD / HKD portfolio: 

 

Made use of the $0 commission from moomoo to sell the following shares won from various contests in moomoo previously:

 

Sold 1 x free share of AAL at $20.14. 

Sold 1 x free share of SNDL at $0.503.

Sold 2 x free shares of WISH at $1.81. 

 

Made a small profit of approximately US$20 in options this month.

 

What a volatile month it has been in the US market. My above options ranged wildly from ~$500 loss to $120 profit sometimes within the same night.

Since the market recovered slightly last night, I decided to close off early and took a small profit as the options have tested the strike price and in fact went ITM several times in the past few days already.

 

Afterall a bird in hand is better than two in the bushes. Capital preservation is more important.

On the other hand I am looking to add several other counters which have reached pretty attractive price levels.

House Keeping Completed

Sold off my MNACT yesterday at $1.23. Including dividends, a yield of ~30.6% is netted. Not too bad for a three and half years holding.

This, together with ESR Reit and Suntec Reit which were sold earlier, completed what I set out to do. The latter's recent run up is 'Ouch' though.

 
Main reason for the selling is their high gearing and the wish to reinvest into higher quality dividend counters.

Moving forward the actions will likely to be buy only unless fundamentals deteriorate for individual counters. 

MCT - MNACT Proposed Merger New Option - Full Cash

I have previously written about the proposed merger between Mapletree Commercial Trust (MCT) and Mapletree North Asia Commercial Trust (MNACT) here.

In that post I also included some calculations to gauge which was the best option for me based on the original two options offered by MCT namely

 

Option 1: Cash + Scrip

 

Option 2: 100% Scrip

 

At that point of writing, option 1 was the best for me as it offered the highest cash value then.

 

Today, a third option has been given to MNACT unitholders which is

Option 3: 100% Cash

More details can be found here.

With option 3, MNACT unitholders can receive $1.1949 for each MNACT unit he or she possesses.

This is clearly the best option for me right now. Based on my holdings of 4,000 units of MNACT and the current MCT share price of $1.88, the return in terms of cash value for the three options are as follows.

Option 1: $4,531.57

Option 2: $4,484.18

Option 3: $4,779.60

Option 3 would give me a return of around 27.5% including dividends collected over the years. Not too bad I would say.

For now my plan is to monitor the share price of MNACT closely for the next couple of months. If the open market price goes above $1.1949 I would likely offload my MNACT units in the open market.

At current point of writing, MNACT is trading at $1.18 and testing $1.19.

MCT is trading at $1.88 after opening at $1.95.

Proposed Merger of MCT & MNACT - Most Beneficial Option

On 31st December 2021, Mapletree Commercial Trust (MCT) and Mapletree North Asia Commercial Trust (MNACT) jointly announced for a proposed merger between the two trusts.

The new combined entity named Mapletree Pan Asia Commercial Trust (MPACT), will become the 7th largest Reit in Asia by market capitalisation.

 

 

More details can be found here.

Now there will surely be supporters and detractors from both camps - MCT and MNACT, for the merger and rightly so.

In every merger there will be pros and cons. In this case I've been seeing a lot of negative feedback from MCT unitholders and some from MNACT unitholders as well.

The main grouse for the former is that the merger will increase MCT's gearing and 'lower' down the quality of their assets.

For MNACT unitholders, the most common feedback I've seen is that their DPU will be lowered upon merger.

For myself I have a small holding of MNACT and none of MCT. My current stand is neutral on the proposed merger.

However to help myself make the best decision regarding the merger, I did some quick calculations and arrived at some conclusions as follows.

Calculations

MCT share price at point of writing: $1.85

 

MNACT share price at point of writing: $1.09

 

My current MNACT holdings: 4,000 units

 

If I go for Option 1, I will receive: 2,003.6 MCT units + $764.80

If I go for Option 2, I will receive: 2,385.2 MCT unit

If I go for Option 3, I will receive: 100% cash per market price

 

So to see how the various options work out for me, I did the calculations based on several MCT and MNACT share price scenarios.

 

Conclusions

 

Based on the current MCT and MNACT share price of $1.85 and $1.09 respectively, the best option for me would be Option 1 in which I will have an equivalent amount of $4,471.45.

 

Pros: Highest value received

        No transaction fees

        Still eligible for MNACT's coming distribution and any clean up distribution

Con: Will have odd lots of MPACT in future

If MNACT share price moved up to $1.14 like it did earlier this week, Option 3 appears to be the best option for me as that would give me the highest immediate value.

 

However by selling my holdings I will miss out on the coming distributions. So need to factor this in when details are available and see how it measures against Option 1.

Pros: Highest value received if MCT stays below $1.89

        No odd lots if I reinvest into MPACT

Cons: Transaction fees

         Not eligible for MNACT's coming distribution and any clean up distribution

 

If MCT share price moved above $1.89 and MNACT share price moved back to $1.14 or above, similar calculations can be done to see which option makes more sense.

For now we have at least until May 2022 to decide.

Review of My 2021

 

2021 basically flew past for me and 2022 appeared in the blink of an eye. With that it means it's time to pen down the customary yearly review for record which I have since done long ago in my head actually.

 

I'm always been somewhat of a contrarian since young.

 

People buy PlayStation I buy Sega Saturn.

 

People chase after the class beauty, I wrote a love letter to the bespectacled lanky girl with tiger tooth (only to be waylaid by the class fatty whom I suspected had a crush on me).

 

You got the gist.

 

So for 2021 portfolio performance portion where most investors reported stellar results, I will report my loss instead.

Family

Our kids are growing up well. The elder one is attending N2 this year while the younger one will be attending the playgroup at the same centre next month.

 

So far it seems like the younger one is taking after his sister's cheerful nature.

My wife and I noticed that from the time when she was still a baby, often times Jie Jie will start smiling the moment she opened her eyes after she woke up from her sleep. These scenes naturally melted our hearts whenever we see them.

Now Di Di is exhibiting the same thing also. 

 

These two cute little ones added so much more to our lives and we cherish every moment with them.

As long as our kids grow up healthily, happily and with the right values in life, I would be very happy.

Health

In early 2021 I attended a personal training course and got myself certified as a personal trainer as I have always been interested in keeping fit.

It was rewarding and I gained a lot of insights on not only the knowledge on personal training, but also in the human anatomy and food nutrition.

Before I attended the course, I have been doing my own workouts comprising of combination of cardio and weights trainings.

 

The workouts were good for weight loss but that was not what I wanted. My aim was to build strength and lean muscle but I actually lost weight instead of achieving the latter.

So after I got my certification as a personal trainer, I wrote two structured training programs for myself with specific load, no. of reps, sets and amount of rest time, etc for my workouts.

I must say this type of structured resistance training works well for my goal. I am seeing the transformation on my physique and body strength despite less than a year into the training.

If there's a chance I certainly don't mind working as a personal trainer as a side hustle. This is something I love and it would be great and satisfying to share my PT knowledge with people who wants a healthier lifestyle and sexier body.

My overall health in 2021 is generally good except for some episodes of recurring back spasms which could be due to an old injury sustained when I was younger. 

 

To counter this I am doing a series of lower back strengthening exercises daily to build up my lower back muscles.

 

Other than that I don't recall ever being ill in 2021.

Work

2021 is not a very good year for my business. Number of contracts secured and value of contracts all dropped.

Earlier in the year, I rejected a ~$150,000.00 project after receiving the PO from the client.

This is because despite having agreed on the scope of work and quotation, the client insisted on us to sign a separate agreement with heavily unfavourable terms to us.

An example of these unfavourable terms is that they have the right to add items to the project if they think necessary but all costs will be borne by us.

I have seen and signed many additional agreement to main contract for other projects. This is quite common. However in this case the terms are heavily skewed against us so in the name of risk management, I rejected the agreement and with that, the contract.

Apart from the above, we also lost a number of large projects where we had high hopes of securing. In a couple of them we were actually the lowest bidder so it was very disappointing to say the least.

We have one potential big project left for this FY. If this is not secured, this FY will likely to be a loss-making one for us.

Investments

I will start off with my regular monthly update first before moving on to the year end conclusion.

 

Dividends Received in December:

 

1) ESR REIT @ $74.76

2) MNACT @ $137.04

3) Netlink Trust @ $204.80

4) MLT @ $217.30

 

Total: $633.90

 

Counters Sold:

 

1) 4,000 units of Suntec Reit @ $1.50

2) 10,500 units of ESR Reit @ $0.485

 

Counters Purchased:

 

1) 1,600 units of Mapletree Logistics Trust @ $1.84 from preferential offering (allocation + excess)

 

Short-Term Transactions:

 

1) Sold 2 x $9.5 DIDI Call 211231 with $0.37 premium. Expired.

 

2) Closed early at $6.93 for 1 x $55 Apps Put 211203 with $0.71 premium.

 

3) Closed early at $1.74 for 2 x $55 Apps Put 211210 with $0.90 premium.

 

4) Sold 6 x $45 Apps Put 211231 with $0.73 premium. Expired.

 

5) Closed early at $0.75 for 1 x $17.5 GREE Put 211217 with $1 premium. 

 

6) Sold 3 x $15 GREE Put 220121 with $0.60 premium. 

 

Total P/L excluding item 6: -US$269.76 (~-S$365.66)

 

Moving on to the year end review.

 

Year End SGD Portfolio

 

Transactions Made

 

This SGD portfolio continues to stay as my main portfolio, providing me with a stable base and passive income to build on to greater heights.

Didn't manage to grow it as much as I wanted to in 2021. In fact the year end portfolio value actually dropped as compared to 2020 due to the divestments I made in December.

 

So in December I sold off my Suntec Reit and ESR Reit to generate more cash and as part of my rebalancing to buy into more quality income-generating counters.

 

I had shortlisted MNACT and CICT as well but eventually decided to sell the above-mentioned due to their relatively high gearing.

Suntec Reit is also facing pressure on their MICE and retail segments while ESR Reit is having declining dividends over the past few years.

Having said that, with the recent announced planned merger for MNACT, I might be selling that also to avoid odd lots in the future. Will be doing some calculations before deciding. Anyway market price will be a determining factor too.

 

In 2021, portfolio suffered an overall loss because I finally decided to cut ISOTeam and realise the loss which amounted to a not-so-cool 5 digits.

 

This is part of the plan that I have made in the beginning of the year: to clear out dead wood from my portfolio.

 

1. Get rid of the dead wood in my portfolio (was planning to do it last month but the price had a drastic fall on the day I wanted to sell)

 

2. Allocate a portion of my investments into crypto currencies (probably 1% of my portfolio for a start)

3. Invest into the US market

So with this divestment my portfolio ended up in the red for 2021, contrary to many of my fellow investors who had a stellar year.

 

On the flip side, my portfolio will likely perform much better in the years ahead now that it has been tidied up.

It feels refreshing to start on this note.

With these divestments and transactions, my portfolio currently holds 9 counters (compared to 14 in 2020 and 13 in 2019).

 

My investment style for the SGD portfolio remains the same: Income investing into quality companies.

 

Year End USD / HKD Portfolio

 

2021 also marked my first year entering the US and HK markets. Prior to that I have been monitoring the US market for a period of time and the volatility there compared to our local market is like comparing an ocean storm and placid lake.

If the local market is for building my income portfolio, the US and HK markets are for my growth elements.

 

I actually started off quite well. Had the first multi-bagger in my trading journey. Then I made a series of stupid mistakes which I have posted here and which caused my portfolio to turn from nice double digit profit margin to the red number seen above.

I have one lesson firmly etched into my mind from this episode. That is not to allow emotions to cloud my judgement ever again in stocks trading.

 

Moving ahead I will still continue to buy into the Tech and green energy sectors whenever opportunities arise such as last night where the Tech counters fell due to the rising Treasury yields.

 

In the options trading space which I also made my maiden entry in 2021, I made a total of 36 trades which comprise written puts and covered calls.

 

I generated a profit of US$1,970.81 (~S$2,671.14) from these trades. I feel this is not bad considering a base of S$20 K initially.

I will continue to use options to supplement my trading income and possibly buy the stocks at the price I want.

 

If you wish to try the US and HK markets as well you can sign up for a moomoo account here.

Year End Syfe Portfolio

 

In March 2021, I opened an account with Syfe after doing a comparison among the different robo advisors.

I started a small Core Growth portfolio with them focusing mainly on the US and Chinese stocks.

Time weighted return so far for the 9 months period is about 7.1%. I intend to continue DCA-ing monthly and let this portfolio run for a longer period of time before deciding on the next move.

Summary

 

So just to sum up my total portfolios value at the end of 2021: S$162,497.41.

 

Last but not least, here's wishing everyone a blessed and healthy 2022 ahead.

June 2021 Updates

June 2021

 

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

S$142,981.25

Purchase

None

Sold

None

Dividends

 

MNACT @ $131.96

Netlink Trust @ $204

Ascendas Reit @ $534.85

OCBC @ $86.26 + partial scrips

MLT @ $216.10

ESR Reit @ $80

DBS @ $108

 

Total: $1,361.17 + partial OCBC scrips

Short-Term Transactions

1 x expired AMC Put 210604 24 with $1.06 premium

1 x expired AMC Put 210611 24 with $1.65 premium

1 x expired AMC Put 210618 31 with $1.60 premium

1 x expired AMC Put 210618 40 with $0.58 premium 

2 x expired AMC Put 210625 35 with $0.42 premium

1 x expired JD Put 210625 69 with $1.14 premium 

 

Sold 2 x AMC Put 210716 40 with $1.44 premium  

Summary

01 June 2021 STI Open: 3,187.23

30 June 2021 STI Close: 3,134.22

 

STI closed below its monthly opening for the 2nd consecutive month after 4 months for rise. It also dropped below last month's closing.

 

It could have been worse if not for today's jump in the share price of the 3 local banks after MAS signalled the possibility of dividend payouts reverting to pre-Covid levels. However this is subject to further stress test by MAS before anything will be confirmed.

 

For my SGD portfolio, there is a negligible (slight) drop in value with no transactions done. 

This month I received a total of S$1,361.17 in dividends + partial OCBC scrips.

Didn't make any transactions this month for this portfolio.

 

When I have no time to go through annual reports, I usually as a minimum, try to read the Chairman and CEO message in the reports.

 

Read the messages for MLT and MNACT annual reports last week. Gained some insights from the messages.

 

Have wanted to blog about the summarised results and some of my thoughts but didn't managed to do it so far.

 

Anyway in a nutshell MLT is impressive as usual while MNACT is less so. Outlook for the former is great while that of the latter is more uncertain.

For my Syfe Core Growth portfolio, I am seeing a higher month-on-month return so far with this month's reaching the highest based on TWR. However would be more meaningful to see the returns and review the portfolio when it turns one.

 

Have DCAed into this portfolio yesterday and plans to continue this strategy every month end.

For my USD portfolio, no transactions were made for this month.

 

Currently seeing a 260% paper profit for one of my counters. Will continue to let it run and monitor closely. It has been ranging in a tight band recently and has tested the resistance a number of times which should weaken the level.

 

Might have a chance to break out higher.

 

Collected S$903.23 of option premiums this month with the expiry of 7 Puts in AMC and JD.com.

 

Other than these, I have sold another two Puts this month for AMC, expiring 16/7/2021 with a strike price of $40 and premium of $1.44.

 

As seen above, I am making full use of the volatility in AMC to earn some income. I certainly don't mind if this continues.

 

Usually for far OTM Puts with near DTE, premium is usually quite lousy. But the volatility in this counter means one can continue to get decent premiums even for relatively safe options.

Moving forward I will continue to use options as part of my investment / trading tools to supplement my investable income. 

Although I have been saying that I have not touched cryptos yet, recently I realised I actually have a crypto!

And that is 1.750 of BAT, worth a grand total of USD 1.01 currently. Well at least that is something.