I recently read the book by Joshua Giersch, a.k.a. Shiny Things from HWZ, Rich By Retirement: How Singaporeans Can Invest Smart and Retire Wealthy.

It’s a great book for anyone in Singapore looking to start investing. Generally short, concise, and to the point. The author even kindly included a TLDR at the end:

1. Start an emergency fund. Save enough to cover six months’ expenses. Keep this money in a bank account where you can get to it immediately.
2. Insure yourself. Get a hospital plan, and if you have people dependent on you, get term life insurance for 20 years, with enough payout to cover five years of your income.
3. Take the money and split it into two piles. Figure “110 minus your age” is the percentage that will go into stocks, for capital growth and dividends; the rest goes into bonds, for income and stability.
4. Take the “stocks” pile and split it into half. Invest one half into an exchange-traded fund that tracks Singaporean stocks (i.e. ES3); invest the other half into an exchange-traded fund that tracks global stocks (i.e. IWDA).
5. Take the “bonds” pile and invest it into an exchange-traded fund that tracks Singaporean bonds (i.e. MBH).
6. Each month, invest a regular amount into those same exchange-traded funds; put it into whichever fund you’re short of.
7. Twice a year, in May and November, rebalance your portfolio - sell and buy the exchange-traded funds to bring your portfolio back to the “110 minus your age” proportion..
8. Go to the pub.

I’m not strictly following his advice at this point of time but I believe it’s good, solid advice that anyone should consider before dipping their toes into investing.

25 October 2019

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