Singapore Equity Investments

Dear Mr Tan Kin Lian,

We are a team of independently opinionated Singaporean retail equity investors in Singapore and our website is at www.sgdividends.blogspot.com. We would hope that you will allow our link to be placed on the bottom right corner of your blog with the other external links you have.

About us
Basically, the objective of our blog is to create investment awareness and set Singaporeans to think more about their investments.

We try to be different and state our own opinions instead of relying on what the crowd says or what analysts reports says. We do not recommend stocks, but instead, show data and fact derived from Reuters, SGX website or company financial reports/ announcement and present to our readers and hopefully, they can form their own judgement.

Hope to hear from you =)
Stephen Lim
SGDividends

US Treasuries - the next bubble?

It is not safe to invest in US Treasuries. When inflation returns, this investment will also drop in value. It may be safer to invest in stocks now. Read this article.

Creating jobs in a global crisis

I heard on CNBC TV that the banks are still not lending money. They take a lot of money from the Fed at low interest rate and invest the money in US Treasuries and other safe assets to make the spread. Meanwhile, businesses cannot survive due to lack of credit. More people will lose their jobs. 

There is no point in giving money to the banks or to businesses. They cannot survive, if there is no demand for their products. People are scared to spend, so they have to save their money to prepare for the bad times. The global economy will collapse, if things continue to spiral downwards. Fear will fear on itself.

The same condition will apply in Singapore. It is important for the Government to recognise the failure of the current system, and to implement a new approach. The Government can create many new social services jobs to keep people occupied and do some useful work in the following areas:

a)  Take care of the elderly people

b)  Take care of babies

c)  Provide local transport

d)  Provide tuition

These jobs can be at $6 per hour or at an specified rate (sufficient to balance supply and demand). 70% of the cost can be paid by the Government (subject to a maximum of $600 per month for each worker) and 30% can be paid by the user.

For example, an eldercarer can make a house visit at $30 per visit. Each nurse can make 3 visits a day to earn $90. The government pays $21 per visit (subject to a cap of $600 a  month for each carer). The user pays $9 a visit.  The carer can visit clients near their home, to reduce the travelling cost.

A person can provide local transport for $1.00. The user pays $0.30 with $0,70 paid by the Government. If the operator takes 100 passengers a day to earn $100 a day and incurs expenses of $60, there is a net income of $40.

The Government expenditure will keep people employed at a modest income level, and offer a service to improve the lives of people.  As the income is quite low, there will be a temporary measure. When the economy recovers, these people will find other higher paying jobs and the supply for this service will dininish. If there is still a demand for this service, the Government subsidy can be reduced to achieve a better balance of supply and demand.

I hope that this type of innnovative approach will be adopted in some countries or in Singapore.

Surrender a Living policy

I have decided to surrender my Living policy which was taken 17 years ago.  I paid an annual premium of $2,102. The cash value after 17 years is $44,893 giving a yield of about 2.5%.

If I keep the policy for another five years, the estimated cash value increases to $62,417, giving a yield of 3.9% for the next 5 years, based on the projected bonus for the next 5 years.  I have decided not to take the risk of a further reduction in bonus, which will reduce the yield below 3.9%. 

By surrendering the policy, I can invest the money in other investments. As the share prices are quite low, there is a good chance of earning a better high rate of return from other investments.

The calculation is based on this FAQ.

Pinnacle Action Group: Class Action in U.S. Courts being considered

Dear all

A top US law firm is interested to actively pursue on behalf of all Pinnacle investors a class action in US courts. It will be on a contingency fee basis - "no win, no pay" and all investors will be automatically included, unless they opt-out, after the class action is filed with US Courts. It will be an action similar to the one being done for Hong Kong Minibonds investors.

However, under US law such a class-action can only be initiated if there are at least one or more lead plaintiffs who fit the following criteria:
(a) US citizens who bought one or more of series of the Pinnacle Notes;
(b) Spore citizens with bank accounts kept in a US Bank who bought one or more series of the Pinnacle Notes;
(c) Spore citizens who own homes in the US who bought one or more of the Notes.

If you fit into any of the 3 criteria mentioned in the above paragraph, please contact us with your name; tel. no.; email and other details such as Pinnacle series no . that you bought, etc. We will forward the information to the US law firm, which for confidentiality reasons cannot be revealed at this early stage. When the US law firm in turn contacts you in the matter of the proposed class action to be pursued in US courts, you will know who they are.

This 'US style' class action, by the way, is separate from the proposed class action we are planning for all Pinnacle investors under Spore law and pursued in Spore courts. In the Spore case, we will be making an official announcement when we have finalized the details. It could take another 2-3 months more to do that since there are many details to iron out. But don't be discouraged, we are not going to allow this matter to simply evaporate and will work vigorously to pursue justice and compensation.

Best regards
Pinnacle Action Group

Email:- pinnacle.action.group@gmail.com 

Meet the man whose big idea felled Wall Street

Read this article.

Motor insurance premiums

Many motorists will have to pay higher insurance premiums this year. What can be done about it?

Read my articles:
Puncturing motor insurance claims.
New Motor Insurance measures - will it work?

If you are not happy with the increase in premiums, you should lodge a protest with your member of parliament or with the consumer association of Singapore.