SAVERs – How to maximize your interest and my Market Transaction/Updates

Market Update – recession

Recession risks are getting higher each day.

For those who are into the market news would have realized that the conditions of the market are getting more and more volatile each day. It can up a lot one day and then down a lot for the another day (I mean for US market).

For Singapore Market, it is generally quite stable since most investors are just holding for dividends. However, do not forget that when the big brother sneeze (US), the rest of the world might get a cold too. If big brother sneeze consistency (perhaps coming soon), let’s better be careful. No matter how stable, it will still be affected somehow.

Interest rate

For those who remembered, the market started off quite well this year but starts to get a little volatile in mid-February. The interest rate also drop as people expects and think Fed “will pivot” early Feb.

We can see from the Singapore Saving Bonds for those who are more into Singapore. This month bond rate (SBMAR23 GX23030A) is 2.9% for 10 years are much lower than previous month rate of 2.97%.

Disclaimer: I have not applied for this month bond as I have already built my SSB bond ladder. I want to keep my cash more liquid to take advantage of the possible upcoming market weaknesses.

Besides Singapore Saving Bonds, we can also see from the Fixed Deposit Rate. They have dropped a lot since February. You can refer to my previous post SAVERs – Best Options to maximize your interests (2) to see how much it has dropped. Just look around the local banks or even foreign bank like CIMB, you would have realized it in early Feb.

Things start to change

However, after a while, things start to change in mid-February (see below: Screenshot 23 Feb 2023 from CNBC). You can see that the US treasury rates start to go up after more news from US Fed. Seems like people thinking pivoting not happening?

Let’s Compare

If you refer to my earlier article dated 13 Feb 2023, about 10 days ago (Portfolio Update: Feb 2023 and Reflection at half-life (hopefully) mark – 40 Years old), both the 6 months and 10 years rate have gone up with US6M even exceeding 5% from then.

If we look at the history for FED, interest rate tightening doesn’t end well. Some investors may believe that this time is different, but I don’t think so. Hence, I will only fast trade now for good counters while holding 50-60% cash as per my update on 13 Feb 2023.

Transaction

To be most transparent, I only aim to trade as of now. Unless the price is super attractive, I won’t buy and keep. For example, today, I bought Wilmar at $3.96 for trade (if I get stuck, it’s fine too. Long term Wilmar will be good especially with potential food shortages). The price is not super excellent but is decent enough especially it still drops after good results. DBS and UOB also dropped despite giving special dividend and increased dividends. All these shares long term will be good, but meanwhile, I am taking the risk off mode. I will only trade for now unless super good price come which my guess should be in the next couple of months. Disclaimer: Please do your own due diligence.

Savers

Ok, enough of ratting about market and my personal opinion. Let’s go back to saving.

Saving is important especially in such high interest rate environment. With such high interest rate environment let’s not waste it and put our money to good use 🙂 However, as mentioned earlier, Fixed deposits rate have gone down for this month but quite likely it will go up again next month due to rising rate)

For me, I want to keep my cash liquid. I have already locked few hundred Ks in Singapore Saving Bonds (SSB) for the past few months as liquid emergency funds. Unless SSB for next month reaches above 3% again, then I may consider putting in more. Meanwhile I preferred to put into more liquid options.

What options are available for savers?

Recently I have put some money into Fixed Deposit with the most attractive being the 4.88% P.A. SR1B for 3 months with DBS. I posted this in private group but not the public telegram group. Next time, maybe if got good lobang, I should post in the public group too.

For now, I think there are only few attractive options which are still available (excluding the UOB One and OCBC 360 which require salary and some spending).

Personally, my eSaver exclusive bonus will end by 28 Feb 2023, I need to find a place to put these money. Quite likely I will put the money into one the options below. Most likely will be option 2 or 3 which are much more liquid as I want to take advantage of the market in case of market weaknesses.

Option 1: OCBC 4.08% Fixed Deposit Promotion

8 Month Fixed Deposit at 4.08% for OCBC 360 Customers. Don’t miss it! The caveat is you will need to have OCBC 360 accounts in the first place.

Option 2: MoneyOwl WiseSaver

MoneyOwl Wisesaver is investing in Fullerton SGD Cash Fund – Class A (SGD) which invested mainly in SGD Fixed Deposit and backed by Temasek. MoneyOwl itself is under NTUC income. It is as safe as you can get!

The latest rate is around 3.99%. This is liquid and you can take out anytime.

Insure, invest, or do a financial planning with MoneyOwl and get welcome Grab credits when you join using my referral link/code. You can use my referral link (or key in 6SHU-93MC) to get free $20-$60 Grab Vouchers when you invest with them.

To earn the first free $20, simply sign up for WiseSaver which the underlying fund is Fullerton Cash Fund – invested in rolling SGD Fixed Deposit and backed by Temasek. Then put in minimum $10 via FAST transfer to fund this account to earn full liquid ~4% yield. Since free money and risk free, why not?

For those who have sign up using my referral, thank you in and hope that you have enjoyed the Grab Vouchers.

Option 3: Fundsupermart Autosweep

The latest yield is 2.751% which is very decent. But the most attractive part of this option is that I am able to use the fund to trade directly and immediately. Option 2 may take a few days to transfer the money out.

Personally, I am using FSMOne.com to invest in funds & ETFs (including money market funds).

FSM is good due to the low comms and the free transfer from FSM to CDP (last year I did a few transfers and took less than a week to transfer. However, my most recent transfer was initiated on 4 Feb 2023 but the transfer to CDP was only done on 23 Feb 2023 around 2pm). Hence, user might want to take note.

If you do not have an account, you can sign up here. Please use my FSMOne referral code: P0413007.

Option 4: MAS Treasury Bills

This is one of the safest options as these bills are backed by Singapore Government. However, the money will be locked up for 6 months. If you confirm don’t need the funds for 6 months, it will be a good option. Moreover, the rates are going up. Quite likely you should be able to get more than 4%.

For those who are unsure what are Treasury Bills; what are the difference between competitive/non-competitive, do read this article (Treasury Bill: Competitive or Non-Competitive?). Personally, I would do competitive auction for at least 4% in case there is some weird freak result.

Good articles that you should read!

People are drawn to dividend investing.

Why? Firstly, dividends provide a regular stream of income, allowing investors to receive a portion of the company’s profits on a periodic basis. This can be particularly attractive for individuals seeking consistent cash flow or looking to supplement their existing income. Additionally, dividend investing is often viewed as a more stable and predictable investment strategy compared to relying solely on capital appreciation.

I always write and share articles, especially on dividends which many people love them. Do read them!

• Simplified Guide to the Key Gist of Grant of Probate and Estate Planning
• Cheapest and best way to trade Singapore Stocks with CDP
• Mastering Dividend Investing: 5 Evergreen Investment Principles
• Unlock Lucrative Returns with IAPD: A High-Yield ETF Providing 7% Annual Yield and Quarterly Payouts
• Unlock Lucrative Returns with SDIV: A High-Yield ETF Providing 11% Annual Yield and Monthly Payouts
• If I am a dividend investor, this is what I would do….
• 7 Things to consider before buy a dividend stock
• 4 Dividend ETFs that can let you sleep well even in the scary bear market
• 5 Best Counters for Passive Dividend Investing
• The Three MOST Important Traits of an Investor
• What is the best investment strategy in the world?
• Ultimate Strategy of buying REITS: XXX instead of X000?
• Ultimate Free 2 Days Reit MasterClass: Exclusive at Careyourpresent.com only!

Alternatively, you can go the right side of my page, there is a search bar where you can simply search “dividend” to see all my articles related to dividends!

Of course, you can search for other things that would interest you such as “Careyourpresent”, “Reits”, “Side Hustles”, “Fixed Incomes”, “Savings” etc.

CAREYOURPRESENT

Money just buy you the chance of freedom.

When you are young and working, you exchange time for money. When you are old, you can have lots of money but you can’t buy time back, especially the things that you have missed while busying striking out in career. Of course, if you love your career, and consciously know that you are missing out the first time your child walk or talk, that’s ok, but if you are the other spectrum, please do something about it.

Your kids grew up and they no longer need you to accompany them. They no longer want to sit on your lap to share/do things with you…all these time you spent in your 9 to 6 or even longer cubicles…can the money that you have earned by you back these?

We always thought we have more time with our old parents, but we are wrong. Time with them is ticking away every day. One day it will suddenly be gone. There is no regret medicine, no reset in time. Gone is gone and cannot come back. No matter you are billionaires or millionaires, you cannot reset this.

We always thought that we have more time with our spouse every day, but we are wrong. One day they will be gone too. When you read this, please go tell your spouse that you love him/her and he or she is the best thing that you ever had in your life.

I have picked out some of the more life reflecting articles of the CAREYOURPRESENT series. Do read them:

• The Best Advice to Parents and Child
• What if Later never come?
• What will you bring with you on your last day on Earth?
• Time is the ultimate currency, not money
• Our Life only have 5 short Days – we should live the best for every day
• Truly understand Living in the Moment now
• 11 Important Unexpected Life and Money lessons to learn from Your Children
• The days are long but the years are short
• Ditch your mobile phone to build real life
• Careyourpresent: Time is the most important
• Careyourpresent: What is your purpose of life?
• Careyourpresent : Greatest Regrets in life
• Careyourpresent : You might not believe it. It’s little unexpected things that make up a real life
• Careyourpresent: Something only happen once in life, if you missed it, it’s gone forever…
• Careyourpresent : Why is Gold useful?
• Careyourpresent: Frozen. Let it go!

You can read more about my articles on Careyourpresent via the Category “Careyourpresent” or simply click “Careyourpresent” via the main menu bar.

REMEMBER:

Love your life daily.

You have one less day with your spouse, parents, children and yourself.

Time is ticking away.

For each passing day,

Enjoy and Treasure your Life!

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• Ebooks and other useful resources on enhancing productivity (Investment, Excel, Notion etc). Currently most of it are free at this moment (subject to change).
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