Investor's Personalities

Our attitudes toward investing are as distinct as our fingerprints. They start taking shape when you think of money, way before we first start to invest.

When we focus about investing or managing our finances, we'll think from our past experiences. Our inner psychology become critical in preparing us to be a better investor. Moreover, our brains are often wired to project the past into the future; e.g. 'this stock has been going up this far, and will continue to go up and further up', as we all know, this is not the truth.

These investing personalities types may help you to realize your strength as an investor:

• Reserved Investors - The average and ordinary investors. E.g. small business owners and blue to white collared employees.
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• Herd Investors - First timers or beginners. E.g. self-employed or professional employees.
• Hard Headed Investors - Seasoned Investors.

• E.g. Seasoned long term investors or short term traders, or part time traders with several years of trading experience but with mixed performance.

• Laid Back Investors - High socialite investors. E.g. high net worth individuals who comprise of lawyers, airlines pilots, doctors, politicians, celebrities and business owners with lot of cash on hand.

• Speculative Investors - Syndicate and professional investors.

• Egoistic Investors - Professionals with scientific or technical backgrounds. E.g. doctors, engineers and airline pilots. Others include professionals fund managers, ex-stock market dealers/remisiers, veteran investors and retired investors.

• Opportunistic Investors - Experienced and professional fund managers. E.g. international and large overseas hedge fund managers/investors who move in and out of the country.

• Discipline Investors - Experienced, professional and high net worth investors and successful traders. E.g. reclusive master investors and full time investors/traders trading for a living.

Attitude and belief to money and investing, can be changed or molded with the right education and mindset. The will to change will overcome all odds.

So, start identifying which type of investing personalities best describe you, choose which type you aim to become, and put in writing what you'll be doing to be one.

Picking a Good Stock

Though there are thousands of stocks in stock market nowadays, not many of them are worth investing. In ever changing business environment, it is not easy for companies to remain profitable.
Worse, hardly any of them have shareholders' interest at heart. That is why, stocks represented by quality companies with effective management team is the key to get a higher investment return

Good stock pick should've consider effective management as it is everything in sustainable stock investment. Thanks to financial ratios, picking good stock is just a simple math away.
Above average EPSGR and excellent ROE is my first stock screening criteria to filter rubbish stocks in the stock market. You can choose any figure which you feel comfortable. But, the figure 10 I chose is because:

• 10 per cent EPS shows that the company has reliable high demand products or services.
• 10 per cent ROE shows that the company are managing shareholders’ fund effectively.
• 5 consecutive years means the company able to survive the ups and down of the market, business cycles or the ever-increasing competition.
• Debt to equity ratio  so that the company has manageable debt during economic crisis.
• High profit margin which shows the management really did a great job in reducing operating cost to maximise profits.

You have to be choosy and determined in selecting which stocks you'll be investing in.
If you love speculative stocks, this method is not for you.

Part Time Investors Tips

With the stock market at historical highs and retail investors getting into the groove, I thought I might as well join in the fun. A common question asked by many part-time investors is how to juggle their investments with their office work effectively without jeopardising either. Here're some suggestions, some tried, some theoretical, some partly tongue-in-cheek in the mood of a lazy Saturday morning, so tread with care (and don't blame me if you are caught with the smoking gun!).

1. Get your boss on your side. Get him/her interested in stocks. Many of them already are anyway, so you don't have to try hard. Once their views on the relative benefits/evils of the stock market are aligned with yours, they will be more lenient towards any minor offences of investing/monitoring investments on the job. They may even look to you for stock tips, hence cementing the win-win relationship.

2. Find like-minded colleagues and find strength in a group. Then you can exchange tips on stocks and on new innovative ways to juggle work and investments. Nothing bonds like sex and money, and if you can't have one, try the other.

3. Outsource monitoring operations to family members. Most often it's the wife, if she's not working. Now, not only are you both bonded by coital relations, you're also bonded by monetary interests. One more topic to talk about at the end of the day.

4. Be careful about using your office computer to check stocks. NEVER use it for online trading. Exception is lunchtime where companies are usually amenable to employee usage of PCs for whatever purposes. Note that the computer audit trail goes all the way to the IT department. If usage for stock market-related purposes is interpreted as overt evidence of using office resources, as well as paid time, to do one's own stuff, then it won't look too good. Not unless it's your ah-kong's company.

5. There are three periods in the day when the time belongs to you. Early morning, lunch-time and after-office hours. (For SAF personnel, insert in morning break and tea break for a total of five). Use them well. Early morning -- check out overseas market performances, and more importantly, read the papers to find out latest fundamental developments/trends. Lunchtime -- review mid-day stock prices and decide whether you want to buy/sell. After-office -- check out corporate developments and overall sector/stock performances, in order to decide possible action for next day.

6. Find a mobile device that enables you to monitor stocks. Check with your broker on what stock monitoring services they provide; they usually do. Don't monitor the stocks (using the mobile device) the office. Make full use of your time. Do it in the pantry when you're getting fresh water supply or in the toilet behind closed doors.

7. A good service to use could be Singtel's I-DEAS News/Finance service. You customise a list of stocks beforehand online; then send an info-requesting SMS everytime you want current quotes on these stocks. The service sends back the required information. Very useful except that it sets you back you 20 cents every time.

8. Familiarise yourself with various stop-loss/limit order options. You could place these orders online the night before or the early morning before going off to work, so that you limit any need for monitoring stocks during working hours. Some brokerages also offer SMS alerts if a stock hits a certain price from above or below. If you're chummy with your broker, he/she might also alert you to certain price triggers from time to time.

9. If one needs to place an urgent order and can't wait till lunchtime or end of the day, call the broker to do a broker-assisted trade. It costs more but don't penny-pinch; it's a matter of 0.1% more commission or so, that's all. Keep your reputation intact, don't use the computer.

10. Turn your weakness into a strength. Your job allows you insider knowledge to a particular industry; look around for new potential stocks in the industry that you know are doing well, in your interactions with your boss/colleagues/subordinates/peers/suppliers/customers. Not only does this confer an investment advantage over fund managers who will not have first-hand industry knowledge, it also makes you alert over time to industry developments and gives you a good overview of how various sub-sectors fit together within the industry you're in. Many companies/bosses fail to appreciate this fact and I genuinely believe that street-savvy employees are of more value to any organisation.

At the end of the day, the name of the game when using office time to undertake your market operations is: Be Discreet. Then you'll be alright. Because everybody does it, believe it or not.

Source: DanielXX

Introduction to Types of Trading.

It's good to know the ABC of trading, including the process of it. Stock market and retail are two different thing, e.g: Stock markets operation are auction-type, where both buyers and sellers are actively setting the price, and retail price are only set by seller.

So how does the stock market price work? Buyers and sellers set the price which is 'bid price' and 'ask price'.

Bid price is the price which buyers are willing to buy the shares. Ask price is the price which sellers are willing to sell their shares. Both bid and ask price are rarely the same, generally the bid are slightly lower than ask price. The differences between both will go to the broker as profit.

There are few types of trading style you can use when it comes to executing your trades. The types of trading are:

Market Orders: As mentioned above, you tell your broker to purchase or sell a specified quantity of stock at the prevailing market price. These are often the lowest-commission trades because they involve very little work on the broker's part.

Limit Order: You tell your broker to buy a security at or below a specified price, or to sell a security at or above a specified price. This ensures that you will never pay more for the stock than whatever price you set as your "limit."

Stop Order: You tell your broker to buy a security at the market price once it reaches a level higher than the current market price. The opposite would be true if you were selling: you would tell your broker to sell your security once it reaches a level below the current market price.

Fill or Kill: You tell your broker to execute the trade immediately; if the trade is not filled right away then your broker does not execute the order.

Day Order: You tell your broker to execute the trade by the end of the day; otherwise, he or she does not fill the order.

Fast Track 2

 

F&N

F&N: OUTPERFORM with TP: S$6.40 - S$6.50

- Growing breweries. It performed exceeding the expectations, with New Zealand, Mongolian and Indochina giving a helping hand. The parent company, saw a grew of 4-5% Q-o-Q.

- 3Q10 net at S$130.6m. After 2 previous quarters of strong growths, 3Q net profit came within expectations at S$130.6m, on a topline of S$1.4bn.

- Is more residential business going on? It grew at least 17% QoQ, as revenue from persold projects grew. CL forecast severe margin contractions, which will continue in 2010.
Residential business – Going strong. More redevelopment? Residential revenue grew 17%QoQ, as FNN recognised revenue from presold projects. On conservative terms, new projects can add S$0.05 and S$0.12/share estimate. Business operation in China and Australia progressed on plan.

Source: CL, DB, CIMB

Comfort Delgro

Result note - Boosted by stronger A$ - by Germaine Khong

2Q10 core net profit of S$58.2m (+1.6% yoy) was broadly in line with our estimate (S$58.3m) and consensus, accounting for 26% of our full-year estimates. 2Q10 group revenue was up 4.1% yoy to $789.3m thanks to growth in most business segments. Revenue growth was also boosted partially by a positive forex translation effect ($15.2m) thanks to a stronger A$, offset partially by weaker ﾣ and RMB. We maintain our earnings estimates. Our target price rises from S$1.64 to S$1.83 (WACC: 10.4%, terminal growth: 2%), after removing a 10% discount to our DCF valuation as we believe that currency risks have been priced in. Maintain Outperform on the back of

OUTPERFORM - Maintained, S$1.55 - Tgt. S$1.83, Land Transport

Source: CIMB

Dividends

"Dividends are payments made by a corporation to its shareholder members. It is the portion of corporate profits paid out to stockholders.
When a corporation earns a profit or surplus, that money can be put to two uses: it can either be re-invested in the business (called retained earnings), or it can be paid to the shareholders as a dividend. Many corporations retain a portion of their earnings and pay the remainder as a dividend." - Wikipedia.

There are 3 types of dividends that you should know:
1) Know their declaration date. It is important as the company will pay the dividends on that exact day.
2) Record date. The company that are declaring the dividends will have to compile all the informations to the shareholders.
3) Ex-dividend date. It allows the investors to catch the last bus up for the dividend payments. It will allow the pending transactions for stock bought to clear before it cashes out money to all shareholders.


So, why buy stocks that gives out dividends? One, it is bonus money. Secondly, it is low risk as these companies are strong, stable and mature companies. They have alot of cash reserves. As their cash reserves grow, debts going low, value is going higher and higher, its all a win-win situation for all.

There are people who try to get in the wagon just in time before the announcements of dividends, they buy it before and sell it right after collected the dividends. Why not, right? You will get extra pocket money at no cost at all. Keep dreaming!

This usually doesn't work, because the stock price usually adjusts immediately to reflect the dividend payout, as interested buyers know the stock no longer includes the current dividend payment and they adjust the amount they're willing to pay accordingly.

Annual Reports

How do you read an annual report? Well, it's up to you.

What do you want from them?
a) Profits
b) Dividends
c) Risk / Stability
d) Growth

Reading Annual Reports are like decoding "MonaLisa". It is not a 5 years old kid book.

There are 8 sections in most annual reports. Not all reports will have all the sections or the same type and amount of information. Here are the sections, what you'll find in each, and questions you should ask yourself:

Chairman of the Board Letter: Should cover changing conditions, previous objectives met or missed and upcoming objectives, and actions taken or not to be taken. Is it well written? Read between the lines; what is being apologized for?

Sales and Marketing: Should cover what the company sells, how, where and when. Is it clear where it's making most of its money presently? Is the scope of lines, divisions and operations clear?
 

10 Year Summary (or less): Is this included? Have revenues and profits increased each year?

Management Discussion: Is it a clear discussion of significant financial trends over the past few years? How candid and accurate is it?

Financial Statements: Check sales, profits, R&D spending, inventory and debt levels over time. Read the footnotes to ferret out other information. (the balance sheets, the cash flow statements, and the income statements), which are discussed in detail in the Financial Statements section.

Subsidiaries, Brands and Addresses: Where is their headquarters? Is it clear what lines, brand names the company has and what their overseas distribution network is?

List of Directors and Officers: How many directors are insiders and how many are outsiders (a good mix is ideal)? Are the directors well-known and respected? Are there an unusual number of directors (5 to 12 is typical)?

Stock Price History: General trend of price over time. Up or down? On which exchange is the company listed? Do they have a history of paying dividends? 

Qouted from IG.

Oceanus

Recommend: BUY with target price of S$0.40

Cutting the loss-making restaurants.
Oceanus has shut down 5 of its restaurants due to loss of RMB8m in Beijing and Shanghai. F&B side has been pulling the stocks down as it is affecting the its whole operation. Meanwhile, Oceanus has opened a new restaurant in Taiwan which targets consumers from middle to upper income
group, in contrast to its previously opened restaurant outlets which target consumers from the average income group.

Expanding the abalone tanks.
It's their main products, adding more tanks (at least 1000) in 1H10. Oceanus is expecting to have at least 32,000 tanks, now have 26,000 tanks. Currently, land is not a problem for Oceanus as they have more than enough land to store all the tanks.

We like Oceanus for its
1) sheer abalone
farming capacity, and
2) low abalone production cost.

Key risks to our call are
1) lack of appetite from Chinese consumers for abalone, and
2) continuing and/or worsening losses of its F&B outlets.

Source: DMG

Broker's View on STI

Hello people, look at the stats. Its their recommendations for the week.

Stock for Beginners: What is Stock?

What is stock? or wondered why shares of stock exist? This introduction to the world of investing in stocks will provide answers to those questions and show you just how simple Wall Street really is.

It is easier to learn with example.
Imagine you wanted to start a retail store with members of your family. You decide you need $1000 to get the business off the ground so you incorporate a new company. You divide the company into 1000 pieces, or "shares" of stock. You price each new share of stock at $1. If you can sell all of the shares to your family members, you should have the $1000 you need (1,000 shares x $1 per share = $1000 cash.

So, stocks in your family retail store and Wall Street Stocks are no different, take a look:

When you buy share of stock, you are purchasing a tiny piece of a company. 
The current stock price of McDong's is S$2.00. The stock market is nothing more than an auction. Individual investors, just like you, are making decisions with their own money in a real-time auction. If someone wants to sell their shares of McDong's and there are no buyers at $2.00, the price would have to continually fall until someone else stepped in and placed a buy order with their broker, let's say S$1.90. If investors thought McDong's was going to grow its profits faster than other companies, they would be willing to bid up the price of the stock at S$2.10 (which is affected by supply and demand because there are only a fixed amount of shares in existence, in this case 1,000,000 shares). Likewise, if a large investor were to dump his or her shares on the market, the supply could temporarily overwhelm and drive the stock price lower.

It's simply supply and demand thing. McDong only have 1,000,000 shares to go around. If there are more demands than supply, the price will go up towards Mount Everest. If there are too much supply, and nobody is buying it, the price will sank down the sea. Get it?

Sell It When You Know It

Fear! 
It is our number one enemy. We tend to be afraid, fearful of losing. One important lesson of any investment skill is fear no more. We, the investors sell away our best stocks based on emotions, making mistakes:

Keep the dying stock.
The longer you keep it, the worst it will get. Its okay to lose sometimes. If you realize it earlier, the better it will get. Some companies do fall. Learn about them. Are they gonna be okay? Analyze their balance sheets. Read what the chairman's notes for the future.

Holding to gain more.
Greed. The more you have, the greedier you become. Be contented. Do not hesitate to sell it. Its better go gain S$100 than to gain nothing. There is always a risk that the price will keep shooting up and up, or worst, going down worst than you expected. Sometimes its is good to protect yourself, your portfolio even if you gain less than what you expected.


Timing the market.
You do not time the market. The market is the mother of all. They can do whatever they want, and you can't stop them. If she is happy, she goes up 10-fold in a day. When she is broken-hearted, she goes down 100-fold in an hour.
It is never your skill to time the market. Sell it when you have to, even though your stock are now S$1.93 and you are waiting for S$2 before you sell. Believe me, S$0.07 is not worth it. In the end, you might sell it at S$1.80. Who knows, right?


Pay attention.
Evaluation. Go through your portfolio every week or month. See what is going on in the company, are they doing well? Are they on track with what they are doing? Reevaluate all the company. Let go the "not-so-good".  Is there any M&A? Who is the new competitors?

Well, now you know. Sell if you have to. Do not fear the market. The greatest enemy of all is you youself.

Principle of Investing

Hi.

What's the principle of investing in stocks?

Start NOW!
Starting early does make a difference. In general, every year you wait doubles the required monthly savings to reach the same level when you retire.
An example:
If you keep S$500 every month for 5 years, then stop doing it, or save S$500 after 5 years of doing nothing. You have the save amount exactly after 10 years. So why not start early?
 
Understanding yourself.
Know yourself. Learn about yourself. What is your goal? What is your need in the future? What do you want? Start drawing a map of where you want to be in after 5 - 10 years. Set a goal, be there after 10 years. If you don't keep reminding yourself of what you want, I am afraid you might slack and go off track.

How healthy are you with your financial system? How much do you have? Earnings? Expenses? Debts? Financial Goals?

Risks?
If you don't make it here, what are you going to do next? Accepting failure and move on is part of life lesson nobody can teach you. Are you willing to take risks? How much risks can you handle? This is all about you. If you can figure it out, you can imagine the risks you can take and learn to adapt with it and expand it slowly in the future.

Plans! Long-term or short-term?
How do you spend your money? U have needs such as cars, houses, girlfriend, family, retirement. It should also detail where the money will come from. Hopefully the numbers will be about the same.

Don't try to time the market. Get in and stay in. We don't know what direction the next 10% move will be, but we do know what direction the next 100% move will be.

Review your plan periodically, and whenever your needs or circumstances change. If you are not confident that your plan makes sense, talk to an investment advisor or someone you trust.

Buy Stocks

Now that you understand yourself, the risk and your goal, invest in stocks. Buy it, and KEEP IT. It require two things, patience and discipline. The stocks will give you benefits, long-term view. Dividends and the stock you bought will definately be a winner. This approach reduces the entire universe of investment vehicles to two choices: stocks and stock mutual funds. In the long run, they're the winners: In this century, stocks beat bonds 8 out of 9 decades, and they're well in the lead again.

Get Help
Some people just can't handle DIY. Try it, and if it doesn't work, seek professional advise.

If you want others to handle your financial affairs for you, just make sure your money is being spent wisely.