Portfolio Review 2016: Portfolio + 28.0% vs STI - 0.2%

The Straits Times Index ended 2016 at the same level it started. After dipping to 2,500 in the January and February, the index recovered to 2,880. This was despite a Trump election victory, which many in US media and Asia expected an end-of-the-world scenario.

The portfolio gained 28.0%, ending the three year streak of underperformance against the STI. Excluding dividends, it would have gained 24.4%. Most of my holdings advanced in price. This was unsurprising given their previous years losses. The biggest percentage loser was Hong Leong Finance. The finance stock lost 8.2% in price. This was followed by F&N, down 2.8%.

Colex and Super Group each post slightly more than 50% year on year increase in share price. Colex remains a very thinly traded stock. Super Group on the other hand, was boosted by the acquisition of the Dutch firm JDE. This will eventually lead to the privatisation of the company.

The portfolio cost now stands at 111.5K and I am in the black by 14%. I collected dividends of 2.3k, excluding the capital reduction paid out by Delfi, and this implies a yield-to-cost of 2.0% which is poor. For CY2017, my yield to cost will likely drop given the poor outlook and that Super Group is put in the freezer.

For CY2017, I intend to buy another 10k plus any remaining cash in the portfolio, just before or after Chinese New Year. I will also need to be on the lookout for places to park the monies eventually received from the delisting of Super Group. I expect the market to go up by at least 5% 12 months down the road. That said, I expect the local economy to be very weak in the coming 6 months. The oil and gas and property sector are not doing well and I cannot see any drivers of growth coming from international trade. 

Portfolio Review 2015: Portfolio - 22.7% vs STI - 14.1%

After peaking in April, the Straits Times Index fell sharply in two distinct phases (Apr-Jul, Aug-Oct), ending the year at slightly below the 2,900 level, or 14.2% lower than where it started the year. There were many reasons offered for the weak markets ranging from weak oil price, terrorist threats, the end of quantitative easing and the hike in interest rates.

The portfolio lost a staggering 22.7%, making it the third year in a row that I have underperformed the STI. Excluding dividends, it would have lost 24.7%. The biggest percentage loser was KrisEnergy. The stock lost two-thirds of my purchase value because of the oil rout as well as my not subscribing to their rights. The biggest dollar loser was PetraFoods, shedding close to 12K. This favourite of mine is said to be affected by the weakness in sales to its key Indonesia market.

Colex was the only stock to register positive gains given the flight to safety. The garbage collector gained 15.4% the whole year or 3.2K in value. Smallest loser was Hong Leong Finance, losing 11.1% or 2K in value.

There were only 7 transactions for the whole of 2015, mostly at the start of the year. Auric Pacific, Etika and UOB-KayHian were offloaded. Hong Leong Finance and KrisEnergy were new stocks to the portfolio. In December, I added some more PetraFood to my portfolio.

Portfolio Review 2014: Portfolio - 4.1% vs STI + 6.3%

It was a roller coaster year for the Straits Times Index. The STI sank below 3,000 points in February but went on a straight climb to almost 3,400 points in August. After which, due to uncertainties caused by Russia and falling oil prices, following world indices, the STI dipped twice in October and December, before staging a strong rebound,

My portfolio lost about SGD 2,200 in value during the 12 month period, or 4.1%. This makes it the third time I underperformed against the benchmark index.

It was very difficult to tell which my best or worst performers were because I had forgotten to track prices from the end of 2013. But a quick glance suggest that the portfolio loss was contributed by overall weakness.

Although I did not actively monitored my portfolio (mainly because it was tumbling most of the time) 2014 was an active year for me in the stock market. Within the portfolio, I made 10 transactions (2 more if I include Super and F&N additions). I also made a few contra trades involving SGX resulting in a net gain.

2014 Action Item versus Deliverables

I forgot to set out action items for 2014, so I will reuse 2013’s.

Blog: I intend to blog lesser but have interesting posts of at least 400 words.

Reality: I blogged even lesser this year (32 vs 39 posts). Aside from that one posts comparing bloggers, my posts this year were less interesting than 2013’s.

Investments: I pumped 16k in capital in 2013.

Reality: I pumped 30 k in capital in 2014. This meant that there is very limited cash sitting on the sides and I am extremely vulnerable to the market gyrations.

Career: I recently shifted internally in my company to a new position and I have to learn a new market segment. I thus intend to dedicate more time on learning about the segment at work.

Reality: I have spent some time learning about the new market segment that I have been handed but it does not look adequate. More will be required in 2015 and this will determine my job prospects in 2015 which at the moment, do not look very good due to the falling oil price.

2013 Action Items

Here are the items I intend to tick off for 2013

Portfolio Review 2012: Portfolio 30.2% vs STI 20.6%

The Straits Times Index opened at 2,646.35 on the first trading day while my portfolio started at SGD 42,053 at the start of the year. In the beginning, I had bought some Etika International and sold my holdings of Asiatic Group. More recently, I bought some Petra Foods and sold off China Animal Healthcare, Stratech Systems and TPV Technology. But for convenience, let me use those values I have given.

Final Score for 2011

The local stock market has closed for 2011 and it is time to update some scores.

Same basket of stocks on end-2010 vs STI year-on-year 

Sgx Stockpicker -26.8 % vs STI -17.5%

This has been a terrible year! For most long-only investors such as myself. As I have written before, almost everyone on the street and the CBD were over optimistic and what hit us hard was the resurfacing of the Eurozone crisis which does not seem to seek resolution. Most market watchers expect a flattish 2012 and for myself, I expect an exact opposite as I expect Obama to work his magic. I could be wrong.

In 2011, I have been buying stock at a higher total transaction value due to better cash flows. This has resulted in difficulties in tracking the portfolio. It does not help that I am not very adept with Google documents.

As usual, I will try to find some way to keep score, but on the simplest level, however:

A. Current cumulative investment: SGD 30,000

B. End-2011 Portfolio value (to measure for against 2012 and includes all new stock): SGD 37,018 and SGD 265 free cash
C. B divided by A divided by 3 years gives me approximately 8%
Frozen till further notice: C&O Pharmaceutical of about SGD 4,400

I have been in the stock market for close to three years and using all the convenient points, my returns on the cash invested out of my pockets amounts to just 8% and maybe 6% if we take a haircut. Most of the large gains were from the earlier rounds of investing during the recovery phase and my recent purchases have fallen flat.

I am not sure how much more money will I dump in the stock market as I feel like accumulating my wealth in cash, for contingencies as well as expected big ticket items. Given that I expect C&O to buyback what is now my shares in the form of physical certificate, SGD 4,400 is a decent amount for me to start hunting for value in 2012. Let the researching begin.

Have a bountiful 2012! Cheers!

Portfolio annual review

I am on leave for the whole week so let me start by reviewing the portfolio. Considering that there have been several additions to the portfolio, it would be convenient to measure the performance of the basket of stocks that were held at the end of last year, and those very same stocks now.

On this basis, I did very badly. I ended 2010 with SGD 45,350 and of of just now, those very same stocks are now worth SGD 33,313, or a 27% decline in value. Since running this blog for about 3 years, this is the first non-market beating performance recorded. No wonder they say that it is bear markets separate the boys from the men.

The stocks that lost the most dollar value were Etika International and GMG Global, with both stocks losing at least 40% of their price year-on-year. Etika International made a steady decline after announcing its one-for-one bonus and adjusting it. The same story for GMG Global, which announced a one-for-one rights issues not so long ago.

I still have about SGD 4,500 locked up in C&O Pharma. I received the physical certificate about two weeks ago and had to read their announcement again because I was unsure if there will be money credited. So far, my understanding is that the money will only be credited much later in January or February. Once I have access to this money, I may plough them back into Etika International or research into more small caps.

Overall, 2011 was a very humbling experience in the stock market and it really thought me the importance of not over extending yourself. The problems that we face right now is the very long tail of the global financial crisis which the Europeans are unable to get a grip on due to the structure of the EU.

Stock Portfolio Review 2010: "Better than I had expected"

The S&P500 index started the year at 1115.10 points and ended at 1257.88 or 12.8 per cent higher. Despite the possibility of a double dip recession, the American stock market managed to chalk up positive gains on the account of more stimulus from the Federal Reserve, notwithstanding the lack of jobs created.

Over in Singapore, the story was much brighter. Not only did the economy surge by double-digits, unemployment rate was also supposedly at its lowest. The Straits Times Index started the year at 2897.62 and added 10.1 percent to close 3190.04.

If you were able to recall, many analysts were very bullish at the start of the year, calling that that 3,200 mark to be easily broken by the middle of the year. The STI only traded in that region for the month of November and has since been weak. I myself was calling 2010 a year that the market will move up a little and this has been accurate to the extent that I did not give specifics.

For 2011, if this is part of a long term secular bull run, I am guessing that the STI will move up 5-8 percent. At the moment I can envision plenty of scenarios that will cause the stock market to trade weaker - China raising interest rates, America raising interest rates (very unlikely), Eurozone meltdown II - but I am a net optimist because there is just too much money avoiding the developed countries. The inflow of capital to Singapore and the region will be the main driver of higher asset prices. That said, I do hope that the MAS increase interest rates to prevent the US dollar from slipping to ridiculous levels against the Singapore dollar. 

How did the portfolio do?

2009 Portfolio Review

The STI started 2009 closing 1829.71 points on 2 Jan and closed 2897.62 on 31 Dec, or 63.1% higher.

My portfolio started with Singapore Petroleum Company and ended with 10 different stocks. To-date, I have injected $12,081 of my salary to my portfolio which has since grown to $21,810 which includes dividends re-invested and gains from the stock sales.