MTGS

Source As expected, they managed to come up with an agreement before the 17 Oct deadline when the US would hit the debt ceiling limit. And also as expected, they did not completely solve the problem, this deal merely funds the government until 15 Jan 2014, this is when they will face another government shutdown if they cannot resolve their differences. Another date was also set for the debt ceiling limit, it's on 07 Feb 2014, basically what this means is we will see another drama if they cannot resolve their differences before 15 Jan 2014. 01 Oct 2013 - Government Shutdown In between - Fight between Democrats and Republicans over Obamacare 17 Oct 2013 - Debt Ceiling Limit 15 Jan 2014 - Government Shutdown In between - Fight between Democrats and Republicans over Obamacare 07 Feb 2014 - Debt Ceiling Limit I know where the Republicans are coming from, they wanted to save money for Americans, they see Obamacare as general waste of money, I also know where the Democrats a

Seems like investors here and the US are not very affected by the debt ceiling issue, me too, I have confidence that the Democrats and Republicans can come to an agreement, just like what Warren Buffet said, "We will go right up to the point of extreme idiocy, but we won't cross it", he predicted a last minute deal that will solve the debt ceiling crisis. I just find the whole thing too dramatic, they are like arguing over something that needs to be done no matter what, why not just do the necessary and negotiate later? If the Republicans have problem with Obamacare, attack it bit by bit instead of putting their economy at risk, and Democrats should be nicer to them, I know standing firm is good, but not in the face of a potential recession. I think the shutdown is more of a problem now, federal workers don't get paid, their families suffer un-necessarily, even affecting US war veterans, these are people who have put their lives on the line for their country, how ca

Just noticed they actually give interest for money parked inside the CPF Investment Account, seems like it's given on the last day of the month, mine was credited on 30 Sep 2013. I had S$20,476.70 inside, now there is S$20,476.87, S$0.17 difference, how many percent is that? 0.17 / 20,476.70 * 100 = 0.0008% Very pathetic, but better than nothing since the money has to go through there anyway.

Initially wanted to buy 19 lots, but unfortunately there was a hiccup, my buy limit is only S$15,000, DBS Vickers suggested that I use up my buy limit first, then request a temporary increase to purchase the rest, but that will mean extra charges. The commission, clearing and trading fees are negligible, the problem was with the CPF buy charge, for every 1000 shares, there will be a S$2.50 charge, up to a maximum of S$25. You can get the full CPF Investment Charges here . Let's see the total cost of buying 19 lots at one go versus buying 12 and then 7. 19 Lots: S$22,239.85 19 Lots 12 then 7 Lots: 14,056.27 + 8,205.15 = S$22261.42 12 then 7 Lots Difference: 22261.42 - 22,239.85 = S$21.57 Hmmm... not a huge difference, actually this amount is negligible, assuming I have 19 lots and if there is a S$0.005 change in the share price, I'm looking at almost S$100 difference, but well, market is closed now, too bad. But today I was aiming for Cambridge, the s

Source The result is for 01 Sep 2012 to 31 Aug 2013. Profit after taxation (S$000) 2013 434,302 2012 586,648 Dividend 2013 Final S$0.08 Special S$0.07 Total S$0.15 Dividend 2012 Final S$0.09 Special S$0.08 Total S$0.17 Total Debt 2013 (S$000) 2,721 + 872,495 + 865,727 = 1,740,943 Total Debt 2012 (S$000) 3,293 + 301,582 + 978,740 = 1,283,615 Long-Term Debt 2013 (S$000) 872,495 + 865,727 = 1,738,222 Long-Term Debt 2012 (S$000) 301,582 + 978,740 = 1,280,322 Total Asset (S$000) 2013 6,373,354 2012 5,485,359 Total Liability (S$000) 2013 2,157,648 2012 1,732,183 Total Equity (S$000) 2013 4,215,706 2012 3,753,176 Gearing Ratio 2013 Total Debt / Total Asset = 0.27 Total Debt / Total Equity = 0.41 Long-Term Debt / Total Equity =  0.41 Gearing Ratio 2012 Total Debt / Total Asset = 0.23 Total Debt / Total Equity = 0.34 Long-Term Debt / Total Equity =  0.34 Their foundation is still very strong, but their newspaper and magazine revenue is declini

If you surf the internet while researching on your favourite stocks, no doubt you will eventually come across this term "Gearing Ratio", so what is it? Basically this tells people how much the company is borrowing to fund its business, too high means the company is at risk because it is over-leveraging, one good example is Lehman Brothers, before their collapse, they were owing way more than they were owning, so when they went bankrupt, there was nothing left to give back to shareholders, a lot of people lost their life savings. In the first place if they didn't over-leverage so much, they probably wouldn't have collapsed. If you do a Google search on "lehman brother over-leverage", sources say they leverage from 30-35 to 1, that means for every $1 they own, they owe $30 to $35. There are also a few ways to calculate a company's gearing ratio, but let's look at the Debt-to-Equity Ratio, where Equity means Shareholder's Equity. We will use the

Bought 10 lots today, wanted to buy with CPF too but DBS Vickers didn't raise my buy limit, I think maybe it's due to the SingTel fire, something wrong with their email, should have called them but was stuck in a meeting, or wait Monday see how, who knows it will drop, then even better to enter with CPF. I like this trust because it has many properties in Singapore and the dividend yield is high at 7%+ and has an increasing trend so far, was thinking of buying Sabana or Lippo Malls, but their prices increased beyond my target, I thought maybe as we get closer to the US debt limit deadline on 17 Oct STI might go down, but well, it kept going up since 07 Oct, I guess people are very sure the US won't default on their debts. But imagine the US went on to default on their debts, I think all stock markets will crash, so what will I do if STI crash? I'll wait, I won't cut loss, no point, instead I will buy more if I have spare cash, actually it doesn't really matt

Wow, there really is a fire, yesterday I overheard my colleagues talking about SingTel on fire, I thought it's some kind of new F1 promotion they are running, seems like many people were affected, from consumers to corporates, even DBS and Starhub were affected, but how come I didn't feel the damage, I was still happily using my fibre connection yesterday, my dad was watching cable TV, or maybe my line wasn't damaged or they rectified very quickly. I wonder if SingTel will be fined for this, I'm more curious as to how the fire started, how can it just start burning like this, maybe a sabotage? Anyway, it didn't seem to affect SingTel's share price, closed flat at S$3.75 today.

No hiccup, everything was smooth and we didn't wait too long until our turn, the officer said to wait between 4 to 5 months, I really hope my wife can get PR this time, if reject again, I will definitely appeal, I will want to know why, I will not allow them to happily reject me without giving any reason again. While at ICA, saw quite a few Singaporean guys with their foreign spouse also applying for PR, have Chinese, Vietnam, Indonesian, Thai, and also saw many foreign families applying for PR, Indians, Filipinos, Chinese, I wonder who will be the lucky ones, almost felt like entering a lucky draw. Looking back, this is the second time my wife is trying for PR, last time we tried was in May 2011, that time I was earning S$2850, now S$3480, my salary has increased about 18.1% over the course of 2 years and 5 months, I really hope this helps because this shows that financially I have no problem taking care of my wife, what else would I need to prove? If talking about years of re

Last Friday they suffered massive losses in their share price, today they took another hit. I hope nobody was doing contra during this time, the kind of losses we are looking at here is massive, more than 90% of your capital would be wiped out. These stocks are very risky, I have no idea how their prices even managed to get so high in the first place and the plunge last Friday was jaw-dropping. Heavy Losses I feel sorry for those who didn't get to sell before the plunge, or those who averaged down, even though I'm not invested but I feel heartache for their shareholders who probably are ordinary people like me, so much hard-earned money gone in just two days of trading. I hope SGX and MAS would thoroughly investigate this, there's just too much that has not been explained, a company's share price won't just drop from the sky for nothing, very fishy. By the way, STI closed at 3136 today, seems like getting lower and lower thanks to the US government shutd