MONEY MASTER

Welcome to the ultimate guide to Singapore Savings Bonds (SSBs)! Here, you'll find everything you need to know about SSBs, from the latest interest rates to how to invest in them. Whether you're new to investing or just looking for safe, steady returns, this guide has got you covered. What Are Singapore Savings Bonds? Singapore Savings Bonds are specially structured government securities designed for individual investors. Simply put, when you buy an SSB, you're lending money to the Singapore government, which pays you interest in return. Think of it as becoming a mini-bank for the government, along with many others. Launched in 2015 by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), a new SSB is issued every month. The goal is to provide investors with access to long-term interest rate returns with maximum flexibility and zero risk. Why Invest in SSBs? Safe and Guaranteed : Backed by the triple-A credit rating of the Singapore government, SSBs are among the safest investments yo...

Malaysia Prime Minister Dato Seri Najib Abdul Razak announced a re-calibrated budget to be in line with the low crude oil price on the 28th of January 2016. Among the most debated issue from the new budget is the EPF contribution rate, either to go for the 8% or maintaining 11% contribution for the next 22 months. There is no right or wrong to go for either one as both options have own pros and cons. By opting for 8%, one will have additional 3% to help cushion the rising cost of living, or it can be used for loan repayment or investment; while maintaining 11% will have everything status quo and maintaining the retirement fund availability. Some argue that by opting 8% will end up paying more tax, but how true this statement is? To me, it depends on how the 3% is use. While I agree that spending the additional 3% on goods will end up paying more tax in the form of GST, I don't totally agree that opting for 8% alone will end up paying more tax. Of course, some might end up payin...

I've recently read a very interesting article regarding the value of debt in retirement from The Edge Markets - Personal Wealth , and I must say the article really open my mind on debt and it gives me new idea on optimizing wealth in future. I like the way the writer end the article with "“All debt is, is a magnifier of investment decisions that you make. If you make good decisions, debt will make them look better. If you make bad decisions, debt will make you look worse." The article is as follows..... CONVENTIONAL thinking would have it that to live a happy life, you must be debt-free in your retirement years. The idea is that you should be reducing your risk and focusing solely on preserving your hard-earned capital. But Thomas J Anderson, author of  The Value of Debt in Retirement: Why Everything You Have Been Told Is Wrong , tells  Personal Wealth  in a Skype interview that he believes this mantra is one of the greatest myths about retirement ever...

Today I've read an article from The Star and I do share the same sentiment with the writer that not all debt is bad especially this quote " Smart money management is not about avoiding debt; rather it is about choosing the right debt and making it work harder for you." The article also mentioned slightly on how to utilize the credit card to free up more cash flow which in the end can be use to generate more passive income. The article is as follows:- SINCE the US subprime mortgage crisis of 2007–2008, we have had an influx of credit and debt related news such as the European sovereign debt crisis (often referred to as the eurozone crisis), the European Central Bank’s quantitative easing (QE) programme and, closer home, 1MDB. It all sounds pretty daunting to the average ears and lends credence to the public’s general fear of debt. But what is debt? The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines it as “an amount of money that you owe to a person, bank, company, etc” whil...

Credit card can be friend as well as foe, as mentioned previously in Credit Card - Friend or Foe (Part 1) , Credit Card - Friend or Foe (Part 2) , Credit Card - Friend or Foe (Part 3) and Credit Card - Friend or Foe (Part 4) and while a credit card comes with numerous benefits and flexibility to one provided that the user uses it well; can be rewarding to him or her as well. Having said so, there are several costly mistakes that one should avoid at all cost - as those mistakes will eventually lead one deeper into the debt pit. 1. Avoid Paying Only the Minimum Payment Typically on a credit card statement, one will see two type of balance due; total balance due or some known as the statement balance as well as minimum payment due. The minimum payment due is usually RM50 or 5% of the outstanding balance. Imagine only paying 5%, with 95% of the outstanding will be charged a hefty interest rate. Piling up debt in this way shows the incapable to repay the debt thus hurting the credi...

On my previous blog post, I posted on the comparison of some of the best cash rebate credit cards in Malaysia namely the Maybank 2 Card Platinum (Maybankard 2 Platinum), Citibank Cash Back Platinum, UOB One Platinum and the Hong Leong Wise Platinum card. Note that I'm using the "platinum" tag to compare although there is the gold card for Maybankard 2 Card, Hong Leong Wise and UOB One is because I cannot find something similar for Citibank Cash Back Platinum, so I think it will be fair to compare the four cards based on the same annual income requirement of RM 60, 000. Today I'm blogging more on the details of the Maybankard 2 Platinum Card. Maybankard 2 Platinum Card comes with two cards, as the name has suggested. It comes with the bundle of one Maybankard 2 American Express card and the choice of either the Visa or Master Card. Having said so, the users prior to mid of 2014 only have to pay one GST or RM50 while the new applicants after that will be required...

As we all might have know by now that the Ron95 petrol price up by 20c beginning 2nd October 2014, 12.00 a.m as part of the subsidy rationalization move by the government. In fact, after the announcement of the petrol hike, the petrol stations are jammed with the citizen rushing out to fill up the tank in order to save some money. While the effort might save a few ringgit and it is a one time effort, still a lot of Malaysians are doing so, knowing that every penny saved count. This is why for the past few years, cash rebate credit cards are gaining popularity in Malaysia - especially those credit cards that offer the cash rebate for petrol like the Maybank 2 card, Citibank Cash Back card, UOB One card and Hong Leong Bank Wise card. Before this OCBC Titanium is popular due to its 5% on petrol and dining and capped at RM50 cash back per month, however the offer ended and it is now offering 1% unlimited cash back. The attached is the comparison of the 4 most attractive cash rebate...

Recently I have learned that a lot of my colleagues, who are few years my junior bought their 1st property right after they start to work and it seems that it is slightly contradict with the article "The young find it difficult to afford a home" from The Star - which brings me to think that it could be the mindset between people from the northern region with the people living in the central region of the peninsula. I see that the people from the northern region, especially the Chinese tend to believe that property is a good investment and one should always get the first property at very young age. Although I personally don't agree on buying property right after getting the first job, I agree that purchasing property must be at young age - and we should not aim for the high-end property but rather the kind of property that we can afford at that time. I personally agree with Malaysian Institute of Estate Agents (MIEA) president Siva Shanker that the Gen-Y definitely n...

I have read an interesting article regarding Malaysian investors are not very smart. There are other similar kind of surveys and articles that seem to show that Malaysians especially the Gen Y-ers are shying away from equities investment and prefer to hold cash than any other investment assets. Below are the whole article taken from Free Malaysia Today - Our Investors Are Not Very Smart, by Scott Ng. Only 2% of Malaysian investors are able to answer survey questions. PETALING JAYA: Malaysian investors are not as smart as they think they are. A survey has painted a dismal picture, saying our investors lack financial literacy. The survey found that out of all the Malaysian participants in the survey, only 2% were capable of answering the five questions posed to them in the survey. This is in comparison with Singapore’s 20% and an 11% overall for all participants. The latest Manulife Investor Sentiment Index in Asia (Manulife ISI) is based on 3,500 interviews across seven As...

A lot of us think that financial planning is difficult, and thus relying on financial planners to plan on our behalf, but financial planning is something that is different from one individual to another individual depending on age, risk tolerance, plans and many more; thus relying on financial planners who usually have certain templates of financial plans for financial planning is one of the costliest financial planning mistakes that one should avoid - although getting the advice from financial planners as reference is strongly advisable. The next costly financial planning that one should avoid is to treat retirement fund like EPF in Malaysia or CPF in Singapore as savings. I come across many who told me that they do have savings and give the example like EPF which is a financial planning blunder. Retirement fund should be treated as the fund for retirement (as the name already suggested), and one should somehow allocate a portion of the income as savings for rainy days. IF thi...

“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...

To a lot of people, debt is a scary thing...but yet at the same time, it is a beautiful thing. Without debt, it would be very difficult for the middle class to consider earning property, vehicles and some other expenses.  In our world today, with the credit card, there are so many ways for consumers, like you and I to manipulate future money in order to enjoy some of the luxurious goods.  DEBT CAN BE YOUR BEST FRIEND I have known people who disdain debt to a point that they would pay as much as they could as downpayment for a property even though most of the time, it only requires 10% of the property price. I have also known people who had piles of debts that it is impossible to settle it, and thus BANKRUPTCY.  There is a simple rule of managing debt...DON'T SPEND MORE THAN YOU EARN, but it really isn't that simple, especially when you want to leverage on some of the low interest environment loan. If you only spend less than you earn, there is also a...

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...

I've read an interesting article on The Star not too long ago regarding what happens when you show-off with expensive things, but can't afford it and of course it makes sense that the consequences of showing off with expensive things which you cannot afford is debt; and in some of the more severe cases one might actually declared a bankrupt because of this. I am sharing the following article to raise awareness among the youngsters who are not having good sense of financial management ; but at the same time placing too much importance on appearing "rich" rather than really rich in net worth although the article applies to almost everyone.   The article is as follows:- Placing too much importance on appearing rich can affect one’s net worth. One may want to delay self-gratification in order to build a strong financial foundation I ONCE asked someone who looked like a million dollars on the outside but was totally broke, this question:“Is your self-worth destroy...

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 ...

This post continue from the past 3 post about the credit card:- Credit Card - Friend or Foe (Part 1) Credit Card - Friend or Foe (Part 2) Credit Card - Friend or Foe (Part 3) While part 1 and part 2 mentioned mostly on the pros of the credit card, part 3 talks about the con of using credit card in which I will talk about it in this part. Aside from high interest and a lot of hidden charges, swiping credit card actually give one the false sense of affordability when it comes to buying "wants" products rather than than the necessities. What are the things that we can consider as "wants"? These are the things like the hot gadgets that just released to the market, like the Apple iPhone and iPad, the latest Samsung S4 and many more. These "wants" products are usually not cheap, especially in Malaysia which can cost almost a month of salary, but there is one feature in credit card, in which I mentioned in Part 2 as the pros, if used wisely - the easy ...

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...

Recently I've just fully settled the PTPTN (Perbadanan Tabung Pendidikan Tinggi Nasional) - the education loan in Malaysia to enjoy the 20% discount that was tabled by the Prime Minister of Malaysia last October on Budget 2013. The 20% discount still valid until this October. There are few reasons I settled the PTPTN loan, the main reason definitely to enjoy the 20% discount, although some might argue that if the Opposition take over, we might get it waive 100%, in which I will not want to go to that. In my opinion and my second reason to settle the loan, I would think that we should repay the institution what we have borrowed, so that our children will continue to have the benefit of getting low interest loan for education; which again many will argue we should be getting education for free - again, I will not go into that. Well, for those who intended to enjoy the 20% discount and to settle the PTPTN loan once and for all, the following is the step by step on how to do s...