Dividends from Kingboard and China Aviation Oil

I have received dividends from my holdings in Kingboard and China Aviation Oil. It is a small amount of $62.02 and $140.00 respectively.

With the $315.00 that I collected from Capitaland earlier in the month, the total amount of dividends for May 2010 is $517.02.

I have also been using the coin deposit machine by POSB to deposit all my loose change into a POSBKids Account for my child's university education fund. Thus far, I have accumulated slightly over $2500 including money from red packets received during Chinese New Year.

Considering that it is still a long way more, I think I still have time to save up more in the future. But at the current rate I am going, the education fund will probably only hit $50K plus when it needs to be utilised.

How Important is Reading?

In front of me right now are two books.

One is titled: "Teaching Kids to Read" and the other: "Supporting Struggling Readers and Writers".

Through my brief interactions with students, I have come to realised that it is important to learn how to read.

When it comes to picking up a language like English, there are various components to it. I like to break it down to 3 main components of reading, writing and speaking.

All my life, I have slowly come to accept that speaking is perhaps the most important skill that one can have. After all, great leaders and sales people are known to be very eloquent. It is indeed hard to find a successful person who does not speak well.

However, I have also come to realise the importance of reading. Without being able to read, people are not able to gain knowledge. If one cannot read, you simply cannot comprehend the information that is presented to you in textbooks or books.

On the flip side, not being able to read perhaps frees one from group think that commonly exists in society. It enables one to search for the truth through experiments and thinking. A lot of great people were known to have problems reading.

If one was not able to read the news about investment, will it make the person more immune to the fluctuations in the stock market? Will it make the person a shrewder investor compared to one who is always reading up on the latest happenings?

So how important is reading really?

Keep Counting and Let's See Who Has More

I remember waiting at a crowded bus stop once and saw a beautiful convertible car pass slowly by. It was one of those peak hour jams where the bus stops were really crowded and the buses themselves were also packed. I could not help but notice quite a few people at the bus stop stare enviously at the person driving the convertible.

It was then that I remembered something. It is very common for people to become unhappy when they focus on the things they do not have in life.

I was reminded through a fellow blogger's posting that it helps to count your blessings. Instead of focusing on the things that you do not have in life, why not focus on the things that you have in life?

Counting my blessings

1. I have a great family.

2. I have a healthy body (thus far though I have put on quite a lot of weight lately)

3. I have spare cash.

4. I have a HDB flat. Though I only own 22.5 square metres of it (based on the amount of mortgage loan I have paid off).

5. I have a car. Another few more years to paying off the debt.

6. I have friends.

7. I am ALIVE!

Keep Counting your blessings to see how fortunate you are.

2nd Anniversary - A Good Time for Some Reflection

This day marks the 2nd anniversary of this blog. Or to be more exact, the day when the idea of blogging came to my head.

I still remember very clearly that two years ago, I was sitting at the balcony of some hotel room enjoying the breeze and just doing some journalling.

Two years have passed.

In this two years, I realised a few things. Perhaps it is the "older but wiser" syndrome.

1. Friends don't stay forever. I have lost contact with a lot of friends. This is due to either a change in workplace or due to other unforseen circumstances. I meet up a lot less with close friends compared to the past due to family committments. What I have realised is that friends come and go. When you have the opportunity to meet up every day because you work in the same office, it seems like the relationship will last forever. Once things change, you realise that you most probably will not meet up with some people again. Perhaps in facebook only?

2. Be a bit more discerning. I have learnt not to be too trusting of other people. I am now a lot more skeptical when I hear advice from people.

3. Investments go up and down. It has been a roller coaster ride in the stock market for the past two years. I am a lot more immune to the ups and downs in the stock market now.

4. Unclear of future direction. I remain very unclear about the direction that God wants me to go with regards to many things in my life. I feel a bit lost sometimes as I do not seem to be progressing in my career. For a guy, a career basically sums up his relevance to society, family and sometimes even defines him as a person. Without a clear cut career path in front of me, I have been lost, discouraged and depressed.

5. Blogging is good but..... At the blogging end, I now blog to keep readers entertained and educated. Hopefully they learn something from my mistakes and experiences. Blogging is good but it takes up a lot of my personal time.

The picture above depicts slaves taking the route from Africa to Americas during the slave trade. Sometimes, I feel like I am on this ship not knowing where I am going and what the future holds for me.

Perhaps I am at the start of my mid-life crisis...

No Such Thing as a Happy Peak Hour Bus Ride

I took the bus during peak hour today. It was around seven pm.

The bus was already quite packed when I first got on. I was literally at the front door holding on for my dear life.

The bus captain however decided that more passengers could still get on at the next bus stop. I found myself squashed like a sardine with the rest of the passengers and had to hold on the frame of an advertisement as I could not get my hand on any hand rail or stuff.

The whole journey was unpleasant to say the least. The bus was totally packed and the bus captain still made sure that all passengers got on board at every stop.

I could not help but laugh when I got off the bus and saw the advert at the exit door reminding passengers to tap off. The "passengers"/ models in the advertisement all looked so happy.

I looked around the entire bus and saw only grumpy faces all around me.

How ironical!

Dividends from Capitaland

Just received a small amount of dividends from Capitaland.

A total of $315.00


Red hot property market

Singapore's red hot private property market is still not showing much signs of slowing down. In fact, The Interlace by Capitaland saw 144 units sold at a median price of S$1,067 psf. Capitaland has also invested heavily in China's property market. I hope to see more dividends from Capitaland in the future.

To think about it, if one does not have enough capital to invest in a rental property, a good proxy would be to invest in property counters or REITs.

Waiting for other dividends....

I am still waiting to receive dividends from other counters like Suntec REIT, Kingboard, Innotek, etc.

Will post the full amount I have collected once I receive them =)

Beware Land Banking?

On the Straits Times today, it was reported that over 200 investors have lost $6m in British land deals.

These investors had been persuaded to buy to a piece of land in rural places like Swindon and Gatwick in England for $15,000 each through Singapore company Land International (Far East). They had been promised "high returns with regular payouts for three years".

The parent company was shut down by the British government in 2008 following an insolvency probe.

Now, investors literally own the piece of land as they have been given title deeds. They now have to look for a way to dispose of their land in ways that might be costly. Investors will also not find any shelter under the law as land banking is not regulated by MAS or any other Act in Singapore like the Securities and Futures Act (SFA) and Financial Advisers Act (FAA)

"As land-banking investments involve investors acquiring direct interests in real estate rather than securities related to real estate and, as such, fall outside the scope of the SFA and FAA." - MAS spokesman

I do know of people who have invested in land-banking before and my advice or questions to them is always this:

1. Land-banking is not regulated by MAS. You will not get any protection from the law should anything bad happen.

2. If you are investing in land-banking, you are literally buying a small plot of land. Do you really want to own a piece of land in a faraway country which you have never set your eyes on? If I asked you to buy a piece of land instead of presenting it as "an investment opportunity with great returns and proven payouts", would you still be investing in it?

3. If the potential for development is so good, why do they need to sell their land to foreigners? Why aren't the locals or the English buying their own land? Why isn't the company seeking bank loans to just acquire the land for themselves and develop them to keep the profits for themselves? Don't give me the rubbish about regulations stating that blah blah blah...

Many people are often too trusting when it comes to money and investments. Always open your eyes really BIG before going into any investment that promises high returns.