Author Archive

Posted on March 9, 2010 - by PanzerGrenadier

Personal Growth and Financial Freedom

I attended a Thai language workshop that my organisation offers as part of the self-development training that staff can apply for and realised that personal growth comes from trying new things all the time.

Personal growth by itself is rewarding. You feel that you gain mastery over a skill, ability or technique and you are also exposed to a new world, culture and reality that makes your life that little bit more interesting.

In today’s globalised world, personal growth also helps you move nearer to your goal of being financially free because you gain skills and abilities that if matched with the right market who demands it, you can achieve a new source of income or alternative second career that could be your ticket to financial freedom.

Planning Your Personal Growth

Financial freedom comes when our lifestyle expenses is met by passive income from investments e.g. rental from property, interest, dividends etc. Many of us can build up our investible capital only through savings from employment income which will remain as the key contributor during our productive years.

Planning projects for personal growth increases your abilities and skills and life-long learning is about about life-long earning! Read more…

Posted on March 5, 2010 - by PanzerGrenadier

Reviewing Your Lens Towards Financial Freedom

This post arises from the gentle prodding of La Papillion (aka Bullythebear) on the state of my personal finance and financial freedom blog posts of late. He commented that I seemed to be busy and the frequency of my posts had gone down.

The reasons for me posting less are several. The most obvious one is that some of my spare time is spent looking after my daughter at home as well as handling a couple of admininstrative issues relating to buying my new place.

Another is that I’ve started to think and reflect more about what it means to be financially free and how I’m starting to fundamentally relook at whether investments and a superior rate of return is the way to achieve financial freedom or to build up my income generating skills and abilities to get the maximum salary and bonuses in my career to build up investible capital.

Developing Lenses and Frameworks

I’ve attended a three day workshop on strategy and from my discussion with the trainer, I’ve realised that the models and frameworks to review and develop strategy really are lens in which we perceive the world around us.
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Posted on January 3, 2010 - by PanzerGrenadier

Reflections on 31 December 2009

It’s the end of the year again and time to reflect on what Panzer has achieved (or not) during the last 364 days of 2009 in his journey towards financial freedom.

Living within your means

Ever since Panzer started his Excel expenses worksheet. He has recorded to around 98% accuracy most of his expenditures. His approach has been to take a cash flow approach, i.e. he records when cash goes out rather when expenses are accrued for simplicity sake and also to give a gauge of how much cash (life force) flows in and out of his life.

The net result is that he has managed to continue to live within his means by ensuring that on most months i.e. 11 out of 12 he will have cash savings on top of CPF contributions.

Panzer hasn’t drastically changed his lifestyle and continues to focus on meeting needs first and satisfying wants later. His approach in spending 10%-20% of windfall gains or passive income on small luxuries gives him the impetus to continue on this path of living within his means.
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Posted on November 23, 2009 - by PanzerGrenadier

Panzer’s Equity Portfolio as at 20 Nov 2009

Panzer is no Warren Buffet, as some Channelnewsasia Market Talk forummer commented, there are a lot of Warren Bluffets around, people who make predictions about equity prices going up or down depending on whether they are taking a long or short view of the market.

What Panzer realises from investing his own monies since 2003 till date is that the returns on cash have been quite poor especially in the last 2 years or so.

Interest rates are so low that local banks are giving 0.1% or so for savings deposits. What this means is that your money when left in the bank is actually depreciating in purchasing power when inflation is minimally 1-2% annually. It was as high as 5-6% last year prior to the global financial crisis that wiped out much of equity values as well as destroyed economic activity throughout the entire world.

What Now Panzer?

So Panzer realises he must stay invested in the stock market but focus more on dividend yields rather than capital appreciation or quick punts for true growth in his investible portfolio.

Let’s examine Panzer’s holdings and why he is holding onto the stock as Panzer will be tempted to take profits but must keep focused on the long-term i.e. 20 years when the dividends and (potential) capital gains would be available for use for his daughter’s university fund. Read more…

Posted on November 12, 2009 - by PanzerGrenadier

Panzer’s 2009 Interim Results Announcement

It’s that time of year again when Christmas decorations are being put up in malls all across Singapore. People look forward to a “white Christmas” although Singapore has no snow but lots of rain towards the end of the year.

Besides spending on Christmas gifts, feasts and other treats, a custom that Panzer likes to do is to take stock of his financial performance from being the fund manager of Panzer’s Net-worth cum daughter’s colleague tuition fund.

Analysis of the year gone past (so far)

The following chart shows how Panzer has performed in the months of 2009.

Read more…

Posted on October 30, 2009 - by PanzerGrenadier

Flow: More Thoughts on Optimal Experience

Following my post about “Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience“, I begin to see how important our own perceptions play in determining if we are happy or not under all circumstances.

One of the benefits of trading in stocks and shares is that it forces you to confront your naked fear and greed whenever you are about to buy or sell shares. Nothing strips away how good/bad you are at stock trading (or investing) then looking at your profits and losses incurred on the trade.

You feel happy when you’ve made the right call and you feel terrible if you’ve lost money and even worse if the loss is realised.

It is from this experiences that I realise financial freedom by itself will not make me happy. It is how I make use of the financial freedom status to create for myself an optimal flow experience in all aspects of my life. Even the euphoria of trading wins fade after a while and I look out for the next “high” from jeeping/panging an equity position.

Happiness and sadness that is dependent on market conditions sets us up for a life of emotional roller-coaster. This cannot be the receipe for a life filled with optimal experiences.

So how can you structure your life into a flow experience even as you pursue financial freedom? Read more…

Posted on October 19, 2009 - by PanzerGrenadier

Panzer Equity Trading Rules of Thumb

Many of us who are working our way towards financial freedom also engage in the frequent occasional bout of speculative activity of buying/selling shares and selling/buying intra-day or within a few days.

This type of activity comes with risks and rewards.

The risks are being stuck in counters and wishing one had not had a case of “itchy fingers”.

The rewards are both the “high” of thinking that one just managed to out-smart the market as well as earning some kopi money.

Panzer also engages in this type of activity on occasion and sometimes makes and sometimes loses money. In the end, Panzer learns more about the market and himself as he will encounter Mr. Greed and Mr. Fear whispering into his ear when he is thinking if he should “jeep” (buy or take a long position on a counter) or “pang” (throw or sell a counter).

Whether he “jeep” or “pang”, one thing’s for sure, his blood pressure and heart rate usually goes up. So Panzer has decided to put up his equity trading rules of thumb as he reflects on what happened when he made the right speculative bets.

Panzer’s Equity Trading Rule of Thumb (PETROT)
Read more…

Posted on October 13, 2009 - by PanzerGrenadier

Protecting yourself from market shocks: learning from Nicholas Nassim Taleb

After having read both his books, “The Black Swan” and “Fooled by Randomness” written by Nicholas Nassim Taleb, I’ve been rethinking my whole paradigm about achieving financial freedom.

For those of you who haven’t heard about Nicholas Nassim Taleb, you can read about him here or visit his website.

Systemic Risks to Financial and Economic Life

Nicholas Nassim Taleb (NNT) has been talking about the systemic risks posed by the rising complexity of financial markets coupled with the over-leveraging scenarios that blew up in the world’s face during the sub-prime crisis. This was the climax of the housing asset bubble building up in the US and spread to the world in the form of collaterised debt obligations (CDOs) that were too complex for even financial institutions and regulators to understand.

Even in Singapore we were not spared as innocent uncles and aunties along with “savvy” investors were hit by the Lehman minibonds scandal that saw a number of retirement savings go up in smoke due to the credit default of Lehman Brothers. Read more…

Posted on September 30, 2009 - by PanzerGrenadier

$1 million 99 year leasehold 3 bedroom condo in suburbs – is the market crazy?

I stay in the western part of Singapore which is not the choicest location for residential properties in Singapore compared to the east and central. This morning, when I was flipping through the classifieds to get a sense of the market value of asking prices of my own residence in addition to other private apartments, I was shocked to see sellers asking for above $1 million Singapore Dollars for a three bed-room condo in Centris. Centris is a private condo that is built on top of Jurong Point.

While I admit the location is very attractive for yuppies and those who crave convenience of being next door to the MRT and amenities, the $1 m still shocked me because it is still in the suburbs.

If this is not a sign of a bubble, then there are either many rich Singaporeans who can afford the $1m price tag or there are many rich foreigners who can afford that type of property investments. Read more…

Posted on September 13, 2009 - by PanzerGrenadier

To Err is Human; To learn is Divine

How many of you have never made a mistake in your life?

Not once?

Few of us can say that we don’t make mistakes at all and reading Musicwhiz’s post here got me thinking about the role experience teaches us about ourselves and how to conduct our lives better with regards to our journey towards financial freedom.

Making mistakes are part and parcel of the human condition.

In my journey towards financial freedom, I’ve made more than my fair share of mistakes. Here are some that I would like to share with everyone today.

Confusing investments and speculative punts

The thin red line between investing and speculating lies in the mind and motives of the investor. There is nothing wrong about investing for the long-term or speculating on the short-term. Bad things happen when the two are confused.
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