Working in a dream job

If you have been reading online materials, you will come across a very common piece of advice, find a dream job and you will never have to work again.

Is this really the case? Even if you find your dream job, you will inevitably become bored. It's the same if you eat the same food every meal every day.

There is no perfect job in the world. What is more practical to me is doing a job that pays well and able to fund my lifestyle and allow me to invest.

I have been thinking, if I could quit and find my dream job, looking for companies to buy shares in. The fact is that because I only do this when I have excesses to invest. But if it becomes a 9-5 job, I dont think I could enjoy this as much as now.

Life is short, and indeed, how many jobs would one have to try in order to find the dream job. Time is essence.

Even if you land your dream job, there are other aspects that could make it hellish, like a bad boss, lousy colleagues, bad company culture.

So I do not think it is practical for me to do this now. Maybe when i reach financial indepedence, i could give more thoughts on this.

Saving up money

 It's been some time since my last post. A few things had happened.

Keppel and SembCorp Industries

Temasek has walked away from the partial takeover deal of Keppel, whereas SembCorp Industries' demerger plan with SembCorp Marine was approved.

It was kind of bittersweet, as news of Temasek caused Keppl's share to plummet breaking below $5 a share. Approximately 43% of my investement are concentrated in Keppel and this is concerning. But I did not panic as much as I thought I would. I believe Keppel will be able to ride out this pandemic and I am still holding onto my Keppel shares. This presents a buying opportunity. As Warren Buffet once said, if you want to buy something, you would wish its price goes down, and not up.

I may consider to load up on Keppel if its price goes below $4.

For SembCorp Industries, its shares remained largely battered. Though it was a breather for SCI to demerge from SCM, there was generally pessimism and its price remained below $2. I would continue to hold onto the shares as I believe it can ride out this pandemic.

I am still in the midst of accumulating cash so I have a few shares in mind to stock up on should their shares drop. Keppel or Singtel. If Singtel share drop below $2, I may stock up on this compared to Keppel.

In a recession, cash is King. Hopefully I can save enough by year end to be able to buy these stocks in greater quantity. My usual buying quantity is 5k or 10k of each stock. 

Still waiting

As a Sembcorp Industries shareholder, the highlight ofbthe coming week woudl be the decisions made in tmr shareholders meeting. To decide on the proposed demerger plan of SCI and SMM.

After that, it would affect keppel corp fate as to whether Temasek would continue with its offer to aquire 51% of keppel corp. Of which I am also a shareholders. This might take another month or so.

If the deal falls through and keppel corp shares plummet below 4, I would consider stocking up on it or Singtel.

Python programming

I decided to learn python programming.

Programming is not my forte. In my life till date, I took only one computing module (think it was C++ programming) during my Uni days. Everyone around me said it was easy and Aced it. I got a B- which was very bad. That was 20 years ago.

Till date, I do not know how to write a macro, so essentially you could say I have completely zero knowledge on computing.

I decided to embark on this as it is the new thing on the block. And it could come in useful in future as there are a mad rush to go into data analytics. I understand python can be used for a variety of stuff and since it is free, why not. One main reason for going into python is because the program is free. I thought of going into others, but the programs are not free.

Started by borrowing ebook from NLB and installed the programs.

so far, I am taking it easy, my goal is to spend at least 30 mins on it on everyday. Starting from zero.

Who knows, i might be able to use it for investing in the future. 

Recent events

I have not been writing the past 2 weeks as I was busy with work and stuff.

Recently, there was an announcement of the proposed SCI (Sembcorp Industries) demerger plan with SMM (Sembcorp Marine).

I hold 12k shares of SCI. Some thoughts I had prior to these, were whether I should let go of the shares at a loss. My average price was $3.

SCI shares were trading around 1.50ish. But I decided to hold on as I truly believe in the potential of its utility business.

After the demerger news was out, I decided to wait and see.

Should the demerger proceed, I could end up with 50k SMM shares.

To me, how I evaluate this is, if SCI shares hover to 2plus and SMM maybe around 10cents after the rights. I would hold on to both till prices recover. With Temasek backing, SMM would likely survive.

If the deal does not get passed, I would continue to hold on to SCI.

Loading up shares

I was 28k short of investing 50k in stocks this year.

Last week I began loading up on Boustead. Why not? Since it was 60 cents, a drop of 30 cents when I last bought.

I had been waiting for singtel and city devt shares to drop, but they didnt.

So i changed my tactic and decided to look else where.

I bought 10k of boustead at ave 0.61.

Next I came across QAF. Though it was not highly profitable and profit margin was low, it had some brand names under its belt that are household name like gardenia.

I decided to buy 5k of the stocks.

Total am 9k down. So my target would be to invest another 19k into stocks.

10 May 2020 - decluttering time

It's been quite boring to be staying at home all day. Was looking for ideas to occupy my time else my mind would wander back to my work.

Yesterday, I spent my afternoon doing three things
1) filing my insurance policies
2) summarizing my insurance coverage in a table in word
3) documenting my net worth (assets - liabilities)

I just bought FWD cancer cover plan and I always forgot to print out the policy details. Yesterday having being too bored to even read/look at youtube videos, I finally went to print it out and file it together with the rest of my policies. I think this is important because in the event anything happens to me, my family member know where to look for my insurance policies.

I also did a short summary of the coverage I had, so that I can put my mind at ease and know at a glance, what areas I am lacking. This is also knowing what I have, I will not be easily persuaded to buy another insurance policy later.

I have also documented my net worth (all my assets - all my liabilites) so that I know my progress. I started this by writing at the end of 2018 and flimsily writing it down in a book. With excel, I can track my progress across different years. I just realised how much my net worth was for the last 2 years, and I could set goals on what to do with the debts.

So far my largest debt is my housing loan and 2nd largest deb is my car loan.

For my housing loan, I would be able to accumulate enough savings in my CPF OA to fully settle the loan in 2029.

Sunday (10 May 2020)
Having nothing to do, I decided to do some decluttering of my study room. I managed to clear out 2 shelves of useless stuff and my tabletop. Now my table has so much more space.

After decluttering my space, I feel that my study room is alot bigger and my mind alot clearer. I could also work out a little sweat doing this.

I think there's more and I would devote around 30 mins every Sat, Sun to declutter/clean my house abit. Usually I only wipe surface tops and mop every alternate days. But with things lying around, dust accumulates and I absolutely hate touching dusty stuff as it would cause my hands to break out in rashes. This is why I try to make sure my stuff are always either stored or covered by something.