MONEY MASTER

Wall Street was shaken by hotter-than-expected inflation data , sending  bond yields soaring  and reinforcing fears that the  Federal Reserve will delay rate cuts . Despite initial losses,  tech stocks rebounded , with the  Nasdaq 100 erasing a 1% decline  and Tesla leading the charge. 🚨 Inflation Surges, Rate Cuts Pushed Back The  US consumer price index (CPI) rose at its fastest pace since August 2023 , dashing hopes for early Fed rate cuts.  Core CPI, which excludes food and energy, jumped 0.4% in January , fueling concerns that inflation remains stubbornly high. 📉  Market Impact: Treasury 10-year yields surged  nine basis points to  4.62% , marking the biggest jump since Dec 18. Money markets now predict only one Fed rate cut this year—likely in December. Stocks pared losses , with the S&P 500 down  0.3% , the Nasdaq 100 up  0.1% , and the Dow Jones slipping  0.5% . 💡 Investors React: "Higher-for-Longer" Re...

This week, the market open lower, dragged down by both financial and technology stocks, after last week's rally in Wall Street. Wall Street opened slightly lower The S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average has their good run last week with an upbeat jobs report on Friday, suggesting a recovering economy. However, the report was not strong enough for the Federal Reserve to consider an immediate increase in interest rates. The Dow closed above 17,000 on Friday for the first time since January, while the S&P was just shy of 2,000, levels that traders consider psychologically important. According to Reuters, at 9:40 a.m. ET the Dow Jones industrial average was down 32.53 points, or 0.19%, at 16,974.24, the S&P 500 was down 6.99 points, or 0.35%, at 1,993 and the Nasdaq Composite index was down 17.83 points, or 0.38%, at 4,699.19. A string of upbeat data from major economies and stabilizing commodity prices have helped improve sentiment in 2016 after a bearish st...

We're just into the second week of 2016 and it already felt like a Bear Market.  Not even the pessimist on Wall Street thought things would go wrong so quickly in 2016.  BEAR MARKET in 2016? Dow Jones Industrial Average sank 391 points on Friday, China is struggling to prop up its slowing economy and calm its volatile stock market, and oil price is below $30 a barrel in 12 years.... The selling has been intense, and European stocks officially entered bear market territory on Friday when the Stoxx Europe 600 Index closed down 20 percent from its record high in April. Now global equities have lost more than $14 trillion, or 20 percent, since June. The pace of the drop has been so fast it’s unraveled about half of the rally since a low in 2011. Investors have fled into the U.S. Treasury market, and pushed the yield on the 10-year note below 2 percent for the first time in months.  

Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) has raised the overnight policy rate (OPR) by 25 basis points to 3.25%. This is the first hike in the OPR since May 2011. The decision was made at the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC). BNM also released a statement, saying "The floor and ceiling rates of the corridor for the OPR are correspondingly raised to 3.00 percent and 3.50 percent respectively." OVERNIGHT POLICY RATE? WHAT IS THAT? Have you ever wonder what is this OPR that these people are talking? I used to have big difficulty understanding the business and financial vocabulary. In short, OPR is the interest rate at which a bank lends to another bank, which is set by the BNM.  This rate has an effect on the country's employment, economic growth and inflation. Generally, it is an indicator of the health of a country's overall economy and banking system. WHY IS THERE A HIKE? There is a lot of reason for the increase in the OPR but there are a...

Have you ever wonder if you could ever retire?  Most people find it difficult to go through the month with their current earnings....so what do you expect to happen when you retire? Is retirement possible? While Malaysia set a minimum savings at age 55 to be RM196,800, meaning that you will have about RM820 a month for 20 years. Quite a small amount but if you have already got your healthcare taken care of, mortgage settled and children's education done, you should be quite safe.  Now, if you think RM196,800 is a small sum and insufficient, then it's better that you be prepared. If you want a comfortable income to sustain you and your family after you retire, you have to start planning now. Not tomorrow, not in the future.  Here are some ways that you can mess up your retirement plan and ended retiring poor. 1) NOT ENOUGH SAVINGS If your monthly income is good enough to cover your expenses only, maybe it should be an indicator that you ar...

The other day while I was talking with my brother, I realized that in life, most of the time, it has to do with Lifestyle Inflation, and not inflation alone that cause the struggle for Malaysians to live in our time today. How many of you remembered how you spent when you were still in your university days? As I studied in local university, I have the option of staying in the university residential for an amount of RM300 (inclusive of food, broadband and utility). We would still go for movie, Starbucks and also entertainment, but most of the time, we would take the public transport. (save on parking). After graduation, some of us would opt for RM300 a month room rental...I remembered some of my friends would even shared a room but fast forward a few years, we would take room that cost us RM700. The old apartment might be in good condition, great location, nice neighbours and a lot of good food....but the new ones are in exclusive neighbourhood....it is not because there is a nee...

“RM5 for a bowl of curry noodles? In my day, it was 50 sen!” Sounds familiar? No doubt you hear your parents and grandparents griping about today’s prices more often than not. This phenomena does not happen miraculously only in Malaysia, but rather throughout the whole world. The reason for the price differences is simple and straightforward: inflation . We won’t go into the mechanics of inflation and its causes here; all we need to know in this context is that it devalues a currency over time by increasing the prices of goods and services. Many of us were taught that when it comes to housing loans - paying them off whenever you have spare cash and the more the better because you will be done with them earlier; and you "save" a lot of interest. But is this true? It is only true if and only if inflation is at 0%, which we all know not possible. With inflation, the opposite could ring true simply because RM10 thirty years ago has higher value than a RM10 today simply be...

It has become a norm for people of this generation to use credit cards. There are those who are very weak in managing their expenses that they blame the credit card as the culprit for their overspending habits. Everyone know that making a purchase that one cannot pay at the end of the month simply spell trouble in the long run. But what if you could take this card, and make it your best friend by spreading your repayments over the next few months of years, at 0% interest. This isn't a myth. Such a plan, which could be very common for this generation, the 0% Easy Payment Plan. Here is one of brochure that I found in SenQ. 0% IPP for 36 months If you are planning to buy the Apple iPhone 5S, please consider this option. Instead of putting in RM3149 at once to buy 64GB Apple iPhone 5S, you only have to pay RM87.47 on a monthly basis for 36 months. If you plan to put the RM2000 into FD first, you would have an additional RM60 assuming 3% interest.  There are a lot of pe...

EPF announces 6.35% dividend for financial year 2013 and it was the highest in the last decade. Below is some news snippet from The Star. KUALA LUMPUR: The Employees Provident Fund (EPF) announced a 6.35% dividend for 2013, higher than the 6.15% declared for 2012. EPF chairman Tan Sri Samsudin Osman said in a statement on Sunday that this would involve the highest sum in dividend payout to subscribers, totalling RM31.20bil. It is 13.66% higher than the total dividend payout in 2012, which was RM27.45bil, he added. Samsudin said the dividend rate was declared on the back of a record gross investment income of RM35bil, a 12.81% rise from the RM31.02bil gross investment income recorded in 2012. "The 2013 dividend payout was derived after deducting the net impairment allowance on financial assets, investment expenses, operating expenditures, statutory charges as well as dividend on withdrawals," he said. Samsudin said equities emerged as the largest contributor to the...

Well, we are still in Chinese New Year mode and entered the Year of Horse three days ago and it seems like it is a good idea to post the CLSA Feng Shui Index, which I posted almost every year. Based on the chart, we are about to have another high this year - mid of the year although pulling back towards the end of 2014. Let's hear from the expert:- "What a breed, this speedy Steed! If we've right-read the riddle-wrapper that retails as the 2014 Celestial Form Guide, the soon-to-be-bourse-boss Hoss that grabs the zodiac reins this year is un toro in toto : pure bull from grass-cutters to fly-swatter. And the result for the Hong Kong market should be pretty much as indicated above in our CLSA Feng Shui Index - an annual forecast of the Hang Seng Index based on little more than a whisper of wind (feng) and a babble of water (shui). For reasons that range from the "Casablanca connection" to a recurring Yogi...

In less than 24 hours, we will be entering the year 2014 and so it is time again for us to reflect on the annual financial goal and how we are doing in terms of achieving the financial goal. I have posted my financial resolution for the year 2013 , in the beginning of the year and for the year 2013, I have set a rather cautious outlook on the global equities - thus, I'm targeting about 10% equities growth and true enough my total local equity growth is about slightly more than 10%, which is within my financial goal target, and in fact it is in almost in line with the local stocks growth. There are some increase in other area especially cash allocation for local equities and the growth in oversea stocks portfolio. Existing housing loan is reduced periodically, while I've finally settled the education loan, PTPTN in order to enjoy the 20% discount . A major purchased done through the end of the year, in which I'm hoping to have it finalized within the first quarter in 201...

The last few post from the blog mentioned that you have been warned regarding the Malaysia's electricity tariff hike and with just about half month to go before 2014 when the thing happens, let us figure out ways to save money. While doing so, I come across the article from The Star and the article is really suitable for the current situation that is faced by most Malaysians. The article is about the unconventional money savers and talk about cutting cost - by all means which include unconventional method. The article is as follows:- FUEL prices are up. Electricity tariffs are rising. In a nutshell, the cost of living is being elevated. Many of us, in our attempts to be frugal, will tighten our belts. Naturally, there are many ways of doing this. The following are some obvious, though not necessarily conventional methods to cut down your costs. Unplug According to ABC.com, certain home appliances and electronics will continue to use power even when they’re swit...

It is so coincidence that just the other day I was chatting with a friend regarding financial management in the family and then yesterday The Star posted something similar to this - Money Can't Buy Me Love , which talks about financial management or planning in a family that should start as earlier as possible to prevent financial struggles. I found that the article is really interesting given that I agree with most of the points and the fact that there are many relationship which fall apart due to the mismanagement of the family finances. The article is as follows:- Indeed, love is a many-splendored thing. When we are passionately in love, nothing really matters in the world. But when the romance settles and financial issues start to pile up, can love be thrown out of the window? MONEY certainly can’t buy us love but it can to some extent, prevent financial struggles. I have seen many relationships fall apart due to mismanagement of family finances. Arguments about mo...

As the Bank Negara Malaysa (BNM), the Malaysia Central Bank trying to tighten the borrowing rule, I’ve been read­ing a lot of arti­cles lately about ways to get out of debt, and I’m not impressed at most of the articles that I've read. It's not that the articles are bad, I just don't really agree with most of the articles. I know that most of the articles will advice on repaying debt as soon as possible and have more savings and stuff like that, which I don't really agree as we are not optimizing the money well enough. Having said so, I don't really mean that we should go and buy lots of stuff and then finally go into bankruptcy. In my opinion, one should really have the balance between debt and cash, in order to fully optimized the money to improve the lifestyle. In fact, a lot of affluent people have certain level of debts that they are comfortable with. To begin with, there are two kinds of debt, often called “good” debt and “bad” debt. Good debt is the ...

I read about an article on Mr. Money Mustache and how he retired at 30 and it was actually an inspiring article to me, and I'm pretty sure that most of us can learn from him. Inspiring in the sense that I aim to retired by 30 before I started to join the workforce, and unfortunately at 30 now, I still don't feel comfortable retiring. There are few reasons that I don't feel comfortable; the first being not accumulated enough invest able cash and investment assets in which can generates the amount of cash that I need to have my current lifestyle. Another reason is I'm still aiming for property and still paying for my property; in which will increase my expenses. So, I look into the advice of Mr. Money Mustache and learn something; though I cannot emulate him 100%, I'm sure there are some key learning from him. The article is as follows:- Meet Mr. Money Mustache. Hundreds of thousands of readers follow his bold advice on his self-titled blog — and for good rea...

I've read an interesting article on The Star regarding some tips on how to spot a millionaire, though I truly believe this kind of millionaire is the millionaire next door, which means, they are very frugal in their spending and they most likely try to buy something to reflect their millionaire status or lead an extravagant lifestyle. While I did some rough calculation before and I understand that having RM1 million is not tough, but surely it is not easy, not to mentioned accumulating up to USD1 million in Malaysia - the number itself is already three times more.  It took roughly a savings of RM2.8K per month for the next 30 years to reach RM1 million milestone, and requires three times the effort to become a millionaire in US dollar. Anyway, the purpose of this post is not to talk about how to get there, but merely on how we can spot millionaire among our friends. You never know, your neighbour might be a millionaire, yet, he looks even poorer than you. According to the ar...

AS we are entering the Chinese New Year season, let us look into what the Feng Shui master say about the market sentiment in the upcoming water snake year. It looks to me we are going to see a downtrend after the mid year, and then rebound for a month before heading towards downtrend from November until December before the stocks having a recovery towards the end of the water snake year and ushering in horse year in 2014.

After a resilient economy in the year 2012, we are now in 2013 and I'm thinking that we have yet to see the worst from 2012. I'm not sure that whether global economy will be getting worse or getting better, however I know it myself that own economy might turn bad if inflation continue to go up, while salary maintaining slightly higher or the same. Hence, this year, I will set a rather defensive financial resolution sort of to protect the capital, while having slight growth over the year in line with the inflation.The target growth of the stocks portfolio is expected to be about 10%, with the growth mainly in the dividend stocks and oversea stocks. As almost everyone in the country are expecting there will be a slight correction in stock market due to the General Election which is due to held this year, I won't be allocating some portion from the salary to the stock market, at least until second half of the year. Instead, the money will go to the house loan first -...

We are just less than a week to 2013 and I guess it is time for us to reflect on our annual financial goal and how are we doing or whether we are still in on track to achieve our financial goal, or whether we are lagging behind. We should always check our financial goal quarterly, and I always check, just to ensure that the goal that I set earlier is achievable and on track to achieve it. If not, then what is the problem until we are side track or off target. Always reviewing this will ensure that we set a more realistic goal in the future, achieving financial goal will give us a feel of fulfillment. Anyway, back to my financial goal, I usually set a very basic and generic financial goals which is to grow the stocks portfolio by about certain percentage, tithing and to clear certain percentage of debt. This year, it will not be any different as well - the only different being that I forgotten to blog it out. The stocks portfolio growth by about 24%, with about 29% of the growth ...

Two weeks ago, I posted an article on the survey that reveals many Malaysians do not settle their debt in full every month, so, I guess I need to keep the momentum in posting articles that will create the awareness on the importance of financial management in the adult life. This is even more important to many Malaysians as the purchasing power in Malaysia is not so high compare to even our neighboring countries like Singapore, so, every penny counts and important. From the article, I found that there are a lot of the given examples are quite true and I can even find those among my circle of friends - mainly splurge to have holiday outside of Malaysia and using a big portion of the retirement fund to fund their children's education oversea. The article is as follows:- Avoiding Personal Financial Crisis ANECDOTAL evidence seems to suggest that there are still many Malaysians, especially the young adults, who do not really practise sound financial management. Consider the cas...