Moving Average Fundamental In Technical Analysis

Moving averages are one of the most popular tools for technical analysis. Before that, let's look what technical analysis is if you have no idea what it is. But if you have no idea what what stock is at all, you can read this post first: Stock Market 101. :)


What is Technical Analysis?

Generally, there are 2 types of stocks analysis method. The first one is called "Fundamental Analysis" where you analyze the stock based on the financial data (e.g. annual report). Few popular and useful methods that I mentioned in my previous post are

• Earning Per Share (EPS) Ratio 
• Price Per Earning (PE) Ratio

On the other hand, technical analysis doesn't look at the financial data at all. It analyzes the stock based on 2 things:

• Prices Move in Trends
• History Tends to Repeat Itself

It basically means that there are always 4 stages of stock cycle in any time frame as I mentioned in my previous post. Because of this 4 stages of stock cycle, technical analysis can make such prediction which cycles you're at and suggest whether you should buy or sell. Cool, isn't it?


What is Moving Average?

If you look at the technical analysis chart you always see this symbol MA, it basically means moving average. There are MA 10, MA 20, what do they mean? The number refers to days and it basically means 10-day and 20-day moving average respectively.  

Example: 10-day MA for APPL

Let's look at the fundamental calculation for 10-day moving average (MA 10):

First Average X    = (Sum of Day 1 until Day 10) / 10

Second Average Y = (Sum of Day 2 until Day 11) / 10

Third Average Z   = (Sum of Day 3 until Day 12) / 10

.... 

....

The first average X is at Day 10 and look back to the past for 10 days. So it basically reflects to the past 10 days average at that point. When you join the X, Y, Z together, you will get a line and this line is called 10-day Moving Average (MA 10) "trend line". So, if the line is moving upward,  it is upward trend. If the line is moving downward, it is downward trend. Simple right?

The good news is you don't need to calculate your own, most online chart (e.g. the yahoo technical analysis chart) allows you to plot the MA trend line. In general, there are 10-day, 20-day, 50-day, 100-day and 200-day moving average. It depends whether you're a short term or long term investor. For example, the larger the number (e.g. 200-day MA), it is usually used by long term investors. It also means that the longer MA will move slower than the shorter MA.


When Moving Averages Crossover...

When MA is used in pair, because of one is moving slower than another, it will have a crossover at certain point. When the fast line (shorter day MA) crosses over and above the slow line (longer day MA), it indicates a "Buy Signal" and similarly if the fast line is below the slow line, it indicates "Sell Signal".

Let's look at this example for Apple share, plotting the MA 20 versus MA 50. The MA 20 if faster line which is in green and the MA 50 is slower line in red.

• At crossover 1, MA 20 is below MA 50. Sell indicator, it tells you to sell!
• At crossover 2, MA 20 is above MA 50. Buy indicator, it tells you to buy!
• At crossover 3, Sell indicator...
• At crossover 4, Buy indicator...

You will need to look at which combinations of MA provide meaningful information to you. Basically you need to try and error for each stock because it works for one stock, it may not work for another stock.


Summary

I hope this is useful for you to understand the fundamental of technical analysis. I'm not sure how practical is this as I'm pretty new to this but I at least refer to technical analysis indicator for selling my company stock but sometimes I do not wait for the crossover to sell because I have already made enough money out of it. Sometimes, we shouldn't be too greedy especially in stock investment. :)

Some fundamental stock experts do not keen at all on technical analysis but in my opinion, I think we should look at both. Feel free to share your comment here if you have experiences on using technical analysis to make your decision in your stock investment! Do you find it useful?

[Update: April 21 2014]: Another very useful technical analysis tool that you can use is "Support & Resistance", you can find more about it here: How to Use Support & Resistance in Stock Investing?. 

Useless Features Review on Samsung Galaxy S3

This is not really a personal finance blog post but more on a product review which I haven't done for quite some time. I'm going to share with you my review (from user and practical perspective) on the Samsung Galaxy S3 that I bought lately. You may continue to read on you're interested...

Somehow not many people talk about  the negative side of this, so I will just start with this useless features review on Samsung Galaxy S3. Of course, this is merely from my perspective.

Useless Features

•  S Voice is completely useless. It seems cool, but I don't think it is effective for me to instruct my phone by voice as compare to conventional way. I can do it a lot more faster than not using the voice. Also, it is not practical in most of the time.

• Pre-installed softwares cannot be uninstalled and the only thing you can do is to disable them so that they won't run in startup. For example ChatON is a useless software by Samsung where now everyone uses WhatsApp.  You can't basically uninstalled them unless you root your device.

• Motion activation  is another cool but useless or less practical feature in my opinion. Well, the most useful motion feature is probably the "Turn over to mute/pause". if you really want to use it. The rest motion features are merely for showing off purpose.

• Multiple burst shot is cool but I think if you can capture with single shot, the picture quality is better. Unless, you really want to capture a keep moving object, then probaly the burst mode is good.

• Face detection to unlock screen is yet another cool but useless feature. It makes me unlock the screen slower. Guess it is another feature to show off!

What are the useful features? All the features that you can find out from web except with those that I mentioned above are useful enough. For example, the "Smart Stay" feature is pretty cool and also useful. It is very practical too!


Buy or Not Buy?

Overall, it is a good buy for me because it helps my life getting effective. Perhaps I have been outdated for too long with my windows mobile in HTC but if you really have cost concern, you should consider buying low-end Samsung smart phone which I think it serves an almost similar features. Good luck!

Malaysia is the most Sluggish Country in Southeast Asia

I can't help myself to blog about this here when I saw this article shared from a  facebook's friend which stated that Malaysia is the most sluggish country in Southeast Asia, ranked 10th "laziest" nation in the world. The original article is here.

In summary, here is the laziest country scoring based on the survey from "The Lacent"(i.e. TheLancet.com). where the highest the percentage is , the laziest the country is. I'm not sure how they do the survey but it seems like you need to pay for it to get the data.


Laziest Country Scoring

South-east Asia
Malaysia - 61.4% (ranked 10th in the world)
Indonesia -29.8%
Philippines - 23.7%
Thailand - 19.2%
Vietnam - 15.3%
Myanmar -12.7%
Cambodia - 11.2%

Top 3 in the World
Malta - 71.9%
Swaziland - 69.0%
Saudi Arabia - 68.8%


Rest of the Countries
China - 31.0 %
India - 15.6 %



Do you believe it?

The next question is do you believe it? Is Malaysia really that bad? The biggest slacker in South-East Asia? Ranked number 10th in the world? Can you believe it? My first impression was I tried to deny it but after some thoughts, I tend to agree with the survey based on my daily observation in my surroundings. But I could be wrong.

Here are what I observe

• University standard is getting lower and lower. For example, a basic fundamental of digital logic question, most graduated electrical or electronic student cannot answer that. What's going on? Forgot to tell you, some of them are first class student too.

• Younger generation cannot take pressure. They like to take short cut (e.g. expecting high increment with minimum effort). When they face challenge, they look for the way out. Is it Generation Y culture? or is it Malaysia problem?

• Top performer in a company is not really a top performer in a company. I have seen many cases in my company that the top performer is not because they're super good, it is because the rest are too worst! Also, can't find any better than them in the market too.

• Have a chance to talk to a first class oversea student from Vietnam who study in Malaysia. Her CGPA is 4.0 flat so I curious and  I asked how she did that. She just told me surprisingly Malaysia education standard is very low and students are very lazy, that's why relatively I'm the best. How true? But the above survey seems justify this.

• Older generation is also getting affected by the laziness culture. Take me as an example, I started to getting to slack more already as compared in the past. This happens to the people who are the same generation with me too. So old and new generation also lazy, what will happen next?

So, what is your take on this? How far do you believe this survey is true? What do you see in your surroundings? Do you see a similar trend that I see?

TakeAways from Private Retirement Scheme (PRS)

This post is specifically for Malaysian - our PM launched a new voluntary private retirement scheme (i.e. PRS) for all Malaysian! You can check the announcement here. Well, I think this  a good news. So, let's see what are my key takeaways from this announcement?


Key Takeaways

• You may ask what is the difference as compared to EPF? The obvious one, EPF is mandatory and PRS is voluntary.

• Tax relief is up to RM 3K as compared to EPF is RM 6K. Well, it is additional. What it means is if your tax bracket is 26%, you will able to save up to RM780

• Contribution frequency is flexible where else for EPF is monthly.  I think this is very similar to mutual fund investment where you can also setup a monthly investment if you want to.  

• You can only apply this PRS through approved PRS providers. They are AmInvestment Management Sdn Bhd, American International Assurance Bhd, CIMB-Principal Asset Management Bhd, Hwang INvestment Management Bhd, ING Funds Bhd, Manulife Unit Trust Bhd, Public Mutual Fund and RHB Investment Management Sdn Bhd.

• You can choose what funds to invest but I guess that is still based on the term and conditions of the PRS providers above. You should check with your agents. For EPF, you only have partial freedom. Remember you can opt for withdraw the money from EPF for investing in mutual funds?

• Withdrawal is similar to EPF, the entire fund in your PRS can be withdrawn when you reach your retirement age (55 years old - used to be 60), you die or you migrate to another country. For partial withdrawal for per-retirement, there will be 8% tax penalty. This is different from EPF where withdrawals can be made without penalty for specific purpose (e.g. pay for housing loan and education). Anyway, for detail you should check with your PRS provider to confirm. 

I believe the details on how to apply this PRS will be communicated by the PRS providers soon. For example, if you're using Public Mutual and I will expecting your agent will be contacting you about this scheme. If not, you can approach them assuming you're interested to apply.

I think I will go for this as it can help me on the tax relief. Will you? One risk that you must understand is the fund that you invest in may be losing money. To minimize such risk, I think the PRS providers will mostly offer those low risk funds rather than aggressive funds. So overall, I think this is safe to invest.

Donate Money Can Make You Rich?

When I was young, my brother told me the secret to rich is to make donation. The more you donate, the richer you’re. So I asked him what exactly the donation that you mean? Did he mean giving advices or consultations? No, the donation is a real donation here in a physical "Money" form, he said. Huh? Is that really make sense? It didn't seem possible to me at all.

I still do not have the answer until today because he didn’t really explain that to me. Perhaps he did not know the answer himself and read this information from somewhere else but have no idea why. But anyway, I have figured out the answer by my own but still not sure if this is the real answer and let's see if my answer makes any sense to you.


Why it can be possible?

How can it be possible by donating money can make you reach? I have been thinking and I finally come to a conclusion why it can be possible. The ultimate answer is you're in control of your money by donating money.


(1) You're In Control

The first thing that you may ask, what is the return in terms of money when you give away your money? No, you don't get anything physically. However, when you are able come to a stage that willing to donate your money, it basically means that you're in control of your money. The control here doesn't exactly mean that you're good in personal finance. The "control" here  means you are in control of your  "emotion" towards your money. In other words, your emotion is NOT controlled by your money and I think that is the first thing or fundamental that everyone of us should learn in personal finance
 

(2) Make Better Judgement

When you're in control of your emotion, you can make a better judgement.  When you can make a better judgement, you can make a better investment. When you can make a better investment, you will get your higher return and in long term you will become rich. That sounds simply but I believe that is true. A truly rich people always have a very high Emotional Quotient (EQ). If you see those riches who have very low EQ, I bet their rich will not able to sustain and I have seen many examples as such.


Conclusion

In short, the fundamental of becoming rich is really on controlling your emotion! However, when you tell this to anyone, no one will get it. If this concept is easily be understood, then everyone will be good in manage their money already but this is not the case. You and I know that.

Therefore one clever fella came out this idea, instead of telling everyone that controlling emotion is the fundamental of becoming rich, he/she is telling everyone that donating your money can make you rich without telling the real intention that is when you start to able to let go the money, you're in control of your money rather than being controlled. So, people follow without releasing the fact that they're increasing their EQ and eventually they will get rich by donating.

It seems ridiculous but what do you think? The way I look at this, the only thing to argue here is do you think a person who is willing to donate his/her money means that they're better in control of their emotion? 

My First Feng Shui Criteria Before Invest in Property

In my previous post, I mentioned that there are 4 different types of Feng Shui believer and I'm basically the "Type 3" of Feng Shui believer who makes a lot of common sense out of Feng Shui. However, regardless of you believe in Feng Shui or not, the property price will still be affected by Feng Shui. So, you still cannot completely ignore Feng Shui.

What I would like to share with you is  my first and most common Feng Shui or environmental factor that I look at before I invest in a property. Assuming I want to buy a residential property in a township, the first thing that I look at is how many different routes can enter to the township. It must have at least 2 different routes enter into your property area and the more the better. Let's see the following maps to illustrate this:


Example A: 1 route to the township

It is not good because there is only 1 way or 1 route to the township. Assuming if any thing happen that blocks the route, you have no way to go out or you have no way to go in. You basically stuck there!

Example B: 2 routes to the township

This is better than example A because there are 2 different routes to township and it is preferable at different entrance as shown. If it is a small area, one entrance is fine too. Of course, if there are more different routes and different entrances to the township, it will be better.


I'm not sure if that makes sense to you but this is the first thing how I evaluate a property before I decide to buy a property. I will usually try to avoid a property area with only one route and one entrance, and if property that has more than 2 routes entrance, I will usually give it higher weightage in my decision making.

Let me know what you think, what is your first "Feng Shui" or environmental criteria before you decide whether you want to invest in a property? What is the first thing that you look at?

Try to Avoid Using "According To"

I attended a seminar last week and the speaker basically over used the words "According To". I think this is very bad, but of course he will disagree. The fundamental problem is you lose the accountability if you use too many other people statement to make it a point. It ends up your audience will think like this - since there are so many "according to", why do I still want to listen to you? I may as well listen to the person that you rely on.

You can use according to, but try to give your comment or argument towards the statement that made by another person whether you disagree or agree and also tells the reasons why. Please don't ever use that to support your idea. The even better what you can do is re-paraphrase without using the  words "according to" because somehow I just feel that the words "according to" try to push away the responsibility to someone else. Don't you think so? For example, you can said something like this: Person X says this too and I totally agree with that because [reason1], [reason 2] and [reason x] rather that using the words "according to".

Even from your day-to-day work, whenever you give a talk, speak to your clients or even talk to your boss, you should always try to avoid using "According To". This is basically to make sure all the words that come from your mouth, you're responsible for that and have 100% confident on it. Then, people will only trust you and believe in you.

So, what do you think? How often do you use the words "according to"? In fact, it is very "nice words" to use especially if you want to push away responsibility and you do not want to own your words, isn't it?

Is Suicide Covered by Life Insurance?

I had a discussion this week after a tired badminton session with few friends of mine and surprisingly they do not aware that suicide is insured as well by insurance. So, I just share it here with you guys.

As far as I know, suicide is covered by your life insurance. However it is only valid after 1 year you buy your insurance. This basically means that if you suicide within a year, you're not insured! lol :) Having said so, some insurance policies may vary (e.g. 2 years), so you need to check with your insurance agent or read the policy carefully.


Why it is not covered within a year? 

I guess you already know the answer. This is to avoid people misused the original intention of insurance.Why 1 year? I guess that is due to statistical reason which usually people won't plan their suicide more than a year. So now you know the loophole. If you want to get the money, plan your suicide 1 year in advance. If many people are doing what you're doing, then guess what? The insurance company will then increases suicide clause from 1 year to 2 years. It is all about statistic for a insurance company so technically they will never lost! :)

Any other exception?

The only one thing is not covered by life insurance is death due to natural disaster (e.g earthquake) unless you buy specific insurance which is meant for natural disasters. 

I also brought a very interesting hypothetical example during the discussion: while you suicide during the earthquake, are you being covered? I do not really sure but common sense tell me the answer is Yes and No. Yes, if the earthquake do not cause a lot of death and No, if the earthquake is the serious one.  I imagine that if the earthquake causes a lot of death, can we still able to tell whether your death is caused by suicide? Unlikely right?

P/S: I hope you do not really want to plan for your suicide in 1-year advance. :)

Using Return on Equity (ROE) to Analyze Stock

Using Return on Equity (i.e. ROE) is one of the stock fundamental analysis. It basically tells how good a company manage its assets (i.e. share holder capital) to generate profits. A strong fundamental company should have at least 10% on ROE per annual. Of course, the higher the better.

ROE = Net Profits per Annual / Total Shareholder's Fund

Notes: 

1. Net profits can get get from the annual report or quarterly report. For quarterly report analysis, you need to get the previous 3 quarter report.  It should all based on annual if you talk about return.
2. The total shareholder's fund is based on the average highest and lowest price of the stock during the period (e.g. annual) and multiple by the number of shares.
3. Just get some online free statistic if you don't want to calculate your own. There are some free statistics of financial ratio that you can get online for a particular stock.

Of course the rule of financial ratio analysis is still the same which you should compare the same industry. So the 10% is just a rule of thumb. If you look at the technology companies such Apple, Google, Intel and Microsoft. They have pretty high ROE and usually is higher than 10%.

Stock	1 Year (Median)	5 Years (Median)	10 years (Median)
Intel	25.4%	16.2%	16.8%
Google	18.8%	20.0%	N/A
Apple	40.0%	30.0%	22.5%
Microsoft	43.8%	44.0%	34.0%

Source: www.stockup.com

Generally if the ROE is < 5% for a period of at least 5 years, we should be careful on that stock.

Related posts:

• Using P/E ratio to analyze stock
• Using EPS to analyze stock

How to Read Candlestick Chart?

Stock charts are usually represented with Candlestick chart to show the stock price at a certain period window.

 

Source: Wikipedia

Black candle means the price opened at the high and closed at the low and the white candle is the other way round. So if you look at the candlestick chart and if there are a lot of the black candles, it basically means that the bears are in control. In other words, the stock trend is moving downward. Similarly if you see a lot of white candles, bulls are in control and stock trend is moving upward. So usually more white, the better!

Candle Stick Components

• High - The highest price for the period window (e.g. 1 day)
• Open - Opening price
• Real Body - Black refer the stock is closed at lower. White refers to the stock is closer at higher.
• Close - Closing price.
• Low - The lowest price of the period window (.e.g. 1 day)

Note: The period window could be 1 minute, 5 minutes, 60 minutes, 1 day 1 week, 1 month and so on. It depends on what kind of stock traders you're. For example, 1 minutes and 5 minutes period window will be useful for day traders. 1 day period windows may suitable for traders who do not have time to monitor the stock very closely.  Weekly and monthly will be suitable for long term investor like me. :D

Other posts that you may interested related to stock fundamental:

• Using P/E ratio to analyze stock
• Using EPS to analyze stock
• Understand market trend before you trade 
• Stock 101: Understand how stock gets started

Will Property Bubble Burst in Penang Island?

People talked about property bubble burst in Penang Island 2 years ago. Some said it had already the peak and today the history repeats itself. People is still saying the same thing, the property in Penang Island is already peak and going to burst soon. So, how true is this?

You get all kind of answers depending on who you ask. :D Generally, these are the answers that you can get:


Yes, It Will Burst Soon

• It is about supply and demand. The supply has already more than demand. You can do your own research especially at night especially for those luxury houses that has already obtained the OC. Try to count how many of the houses have their lights on. You will only see < 30% occupied on majority of the ready house development. Thus, it is going to burst soon.

[My Comment]: This makes sense but the location is the key here. Not all location have the similar symptoms and it also depends on when you do the research. A ready housing development takes 1 to 2 years to have > 80% occupations. Probably 1.5 years is a good time for you to such research. 

• I just don’t afford to buy and I hope it will burst soon. So, I am waiting for that moment and tell everyone that the property is going to burst soon.

[My Comment]:  I guess just need to ignore this because no supporting data. Many people are telling that property bubble will burst and in reality is they “hope” it will be burst. Not a smart argument anyway.


No, It Will Not Burst

• The property is in good shape. Generally property in Malaysia or even in Penang Island is still a lot more cheaper than our neighbor countries. Thus, it will not burst anytime soon because we have a lot of foreign investors.

[My Comment]: About 30% are foreigner investor including those Malaysian who worked out of the country. This is what the most developers told me. However, assuming if you do your own research and found out that only 30% of houses being occupied. So where does the 40% go? Yes, speculation but it still doesn’t mean the bubble will burst.

• Penang property was undervalued in 5 years ago and  it was not appreciating as it supposed to be. Therefore, the recent past few years rapid appreciation was just catch up with the past. So, it will not burst.

[My Comment]: Yes, it makes sense but it also depends on how long the appreciation goes. If it still continue appreciate like crazy, it may burst. However, you have seen government and the banker have taken steps to control the peak by slowing it down. When it is slowing down, the burst won’t happen.


What Should I Do Now?

I know you desperate to know the answer but from my comments above, you can kind of can guess that I”m more bias towards to say there will not burst in Penang property market. In my opinion, when the supply more than demand, it will not burst but it will only be stable down for probably 2 - 3 years. This is because most investors including speculators are rich (I believe) and they will not easily to let go to sell at lower price. After the property market correction, it will then catch up again.

However from a personal finance perspective, you should always plan for the worst. You should always assume the property bubble is going to burst. Let’s say if you’re buying a $1M house, you should expecting of losing of 35%  (based on the US sub-prime crisis data – refer here: worldwide house price trend till 2010).  So, if you afford to lose $350K, then you can go for it.


P/S: If you interested on looking at the average transaction property market in other states of Malaysia, you can refer to here.

Paid Stuff May Not Be Useful and Cheap

I just feel like want to respond to an article titled “Free Stuff May Not Be Free” by Azizi Ali that I read few weeks ago in the local Personal Money magazine published in Feb 2012. He is a writer, speaker and coach on money matters and a lot of useful personal finance tips have been given by him either his seminars or his books. In fact, I learn a lot from him!

Let’s see what are my responses for some of of key summary messages by him in that article:

Azizi Ali: I’ve learnt in life is that free things can be expensive!

[My Comment]: I’ve learnt in life that paid things can be even more expensive as well! You pay but you get nothing and you also waste your time.


Azizi Ali: Most things that are free will cost you a lot in non-monetary term.

[My Comment]: Is this true? I found that it happens to most thing that are NOT free too. In fact, I think the chances of paid stuff costs even more is higher because you pay both monetary and non-monetary term!


Azizi Ali: Free things are almost always not convenient. You get second-rate treatment when you get things for free.

[My Comment]: Maybe true but this is an opportunity cost that we’re talking about and the most important thing is it is vary from one to another. E.g. Not convenient but it gives you lower opportunity cost than you pay, you may still want to go for free things!


Azizi Ali: By willing to pay, you get to choose the best (people, place, gadgets and environment), get to choose the time and place, and can be in control and get far better treatment.

[My Comment]: Best people? May not be. A lot of best people doing free stuff! or maybe I should say the other way round. A lot of worst people doing paid stuff too and if you pay them, you will get cheated by them!

Best place, gadgets and environment? Yes, most likely but it won’t be cheap. Get to choose the time and place? Yes, I agree too but for “BEST” time and “BEST” place, you will have to pay more. Can be in control and get far better treatment? Yes, sure as long as you can pay. Again this is all about opportunity cost.




What do you think?

Free stuff may not be free but paid stuff may not be useful and cheap as well. From my point of view, you should always try to get the free stuff first if possible. There are a lot of useful free stuff out there. The question is whether you can make those free stuff become the useful one? A smart person usually can do that. If you can’t (doesn’t mean you’re stupid by the way), then probably you can start to consider paid stuff. Also, everything is about opportunity cost if you want to get a paid stuff. E.g. For this amount of payment, is it worth? 

What is your comment? Do you think paid stuff are usually good one or the other way round?

Average Salary in Australia by Industry

If you’re planning to migrate to Australia especially as a skilled immigrant, the first thing that in mind is what kind of job that you can get there and what is the average salary. Table below shows the average salary in Australia by different industries:

Industry	AUD / Year
Accountant	85,944
Engineering	128,589
IT & Telecommunication	100,572
Marketing	89,904
Admin / Office Support	54,037
Mining, Oil & Gas	155,860
Human Resources & Recruitment	89,386
Manufacturing	84,712
Construction, Building & Architecture	122, 055
Education & Training	64,824

The top 3 highest income industries are, Mining/Oil & Gas, Engineering and Construction/Building & Architecture. Engineering is the second highest income among all the industry! This seems to be a good news to me but it is not really (in case you do not know, I’m in Engineering field). This is because when you look into more details of “Engineering field” job opportunity that you can find in Australia, almost none of them are related to semi-conductor field (which is my exact field in engineering). So, this doesn’t look good to me. If you have friends who work on any semi-conductor field in Australia, I appreciate you can share me the information. :)

Interestingly, IT & Telecommunication is at the fourth place. No wonder the immigration agents got back to me with all kind of IT related questions. Unfortunately,  I do not have the real IT experiences too. If I really need to get a job there, it seems like I need to really expand my skill sets beyond my existing industry either by self-learning or changing my career now within Malaysia to other industry. However, not all experiences can be learned through self-learning. Change to other industry? I may need to think twice because all my existing experiences in my current industry will be all wasted.

As you can see, there are challenges to migrate to another country. It is not as easy as I thought unless I have plenty of cash but that is not considered as skilled immigrant already. It is more like migration with “Money”! – means the country wants you not because of your skills but your money.  This may be a better route for me but the challenge is I will need to make sure that the cash is enough for me to retire there and it is still better I can get a job there. Or else I feel like a useless guy there.

Just a piece of information to share with you guys since researching in migration to Australia in one of my 2012 resolutions…

Why Indonesia is identified as N-11 and G-20?

I read this from personal finance magazine and I think it is worth to share it here about Indonesia facts and figures. This probably explains why Indonesia is being selected as part of the N-11 and G-20?

In case you do not know, N-11 stands for Next Eleven are eleven countries (i.e. Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, South Korea, Turkey, and Vietnam) that are being selected by Goldman Sachs investment bank as having a high potential of becoming the world’s largest economies in 21st century. See N-11 in Wikipedia.

Similar to N-11, G-20 stands for group of 20 countries which represent the 80% of the world economy and is believed will be replacing the G8 – Group of Eight major economy countries (i.e. Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, United Kingdom, United States). See G-20 and G8 in Wikipedia.

Please don’t feel sad if your country is not being selected (e.g Malaysia). :D


Indonesia Facts and Figures

Indicators	2005 (%)	2006 (%)	2007 (%)	2008 (%)	2009 (%)	2010 (%)
Economic growth	5.70	5.50	6.30	6.20	4.50	6.10
Inflation	17.10	6.60	6.70	11.10	2.78	6.96
Exchange rate (IDR/USD)	9,713	9,050	9,130	9,691	9,400	8,991
Unemployment Rate	11.2	10.3	9.1	8.3	8.4	7.14
Poverty rate	16.0	17.80	16.60	15.40	14.15	12.13

Source: Coordinating Ministry for Economic Affairs, Indonesia, and Central Bureau of Statistics
 
The only one key highlight here in my opinion (although the magazine highlight a lot of them) is the Indonesia Economy growth is not affected by the global recession of 2008/2009. If you look at the GDP growth rate in Malaysia, we were having recession during that time. From this perspective, Indonesia is pretty strong.

However, if you look the Indonesian unit trusts in Malaysia, not all of them are making money except for PB Indonesia Balanced and Public Indonesia Select funds from public mutual.

Pure Indonesian Funds	6 months return (%)	1 Year Return ended in Dec 9, 2011 (%)
MAAKL Indonesia Equity	-5.93	-7.70
OSK-UOB Indonesia Equity Growth	-3.04	N/A
PB Indonesia Balanced	3.17	8.91
Public Indonesia Select	2.75	7.96
PRIndonesia Equity	-5.72	N/A

Source: Personal Money (February Edition)

This probably tells you that you should buy from the largest unit trust company in Malaysia or it is too early to tell anything now since unit trust is merely for long term investment. I used to have the Public Indonesia Select fund but I have already sold most of them as the return is not as good as the rest. Perhaps I should invest again in this fund?

My take whether we should invest in Indonesia? Yes, let's go for it. Investing in unit trust is a good start. What is your take?

How to Deal with Anonymous Call Smartly?

I”m not sure why lately I have been receiving so many anonymous calls either there are from banks, internet providers, or others. They usually call you to sell their promotions and most of the time is “FREE”! :) But the strange thing is most of these offers or promotions are not mentioned in their official website according to those who call me. Huh? Oh yes, they usually say this only for phone call promotion and you’re one being selected.


How to deal with anonymous call smartly?

That depends on whether you’re single and available or not? Yes, you do not hear wrongly. When you’re single, you want to meet people as many as possible and you do not want to miss a single chance to miss your future wife. Sorry, I’m talking from a male perspective because >90% of such call is coming from a pretty voice lady. :D Okay, so how should you deal with such call?

These are the few options you can choose:


Option 1: For Male and Single :)

Anonymous call: This is calling from XXXX. We would like to offer you XXXX and it is free. Blah, blah, blah… not sure why they’re very good in taking and usually they talk for quite some time…

You: Yes, I’m interest but can we meet to talk about this in detail? It it is very hard for me to understand what your’re talking without talking to your face to face. Also, can I have your h/p number as well just in case I do not see you so that I can call you?

Your objective here is to meet. That’s it and drive the conversation to meet her no matter what she talks. If she doesn’t want to or imply not to, just say “Bye Bye” to her and “Sorry I can’t understand this without talking to the person 1:1”.  This option is not for everyone especially you’re female. But if you’re male and single, are you sure you do not want to go for option 1? lol!!!

Option 2: For Interested People

If you are interested in the promotion or the offer, you still want to meet them but make sure you meet them in their office. For example, if bank calls you, make an appointment with them in bank and just remember do not make an appointment outside of the bank.

What if this offer or promotion only for phone call? You have 2 options. First option is to reject, the second option is continue to analyse this person. But go for this option only if you think you’re smart. What you need to do is to “Wait and See” what information that he/she is trying to get from you and try to minimize providing your information to him/her.

These are few things to consider when they start asking information from you:

• Are those information relevant? Assuming if they ask about your credit card number, what they need this information for since the offer is free? You can ask them and listen to their respond whether is reasonable. 

• Don’t they already have such information? Think of this way, why the bank wants to ask for your credit card number since they already have it? You can just tell them, you already have it. :)

• Verify them by asking them few questions about your personal. What is my I/C number? What is my email address? Ask few more if possible. If they don’t know, just challenge them. They should already know such information.

Option 3: For Not Interested People

I’m usually this type of people but I’m little bit polite at first (usually) because I do not reject them directly. I still want to know what they offer also and to verify them at the same time. This is how I usually go:

Me: Can you please send me the information to my email? I will get in touch with you if I”m really interested. 

Anonymous call: Sorry, I don’t have your email. Can you give me your email?

Me: You should already have my email.

Anonymous call: I don’t have.

Me: Then, you will have to figure out that yourself.

Most of my accounts are linked to my email but if they don’t have it, then it is something wrong already. Don’t you think so? If they really do not have my email,  I think that is the problem that they need to figure out.


Which option do you choose usually?

I tried option 1 before when I was young. lol!  Unfortunately in practical, they don’t want to meet you! :D So I don’t get any chances to meet those  cute voice pretty girls.

For option 2, I tried that before too but it ends up they can’t explain why they need such irrelevant information from me. It was like about few years ago.

For option 3, I tried a lot these days because the anonymous calls are really a lot. So far, I only received 1 email out of don’t know how many calls and it turned out is the valid one. Later, I met the banker in bank to understand their products more and it turned out is a pretty lady. Not bad huh? But at the end, I still do not buy from them.

Any experience that you would like to share?
  
P/S: I talked about this because I have a friend’s family member getting cheated by this type of anonymous call. What surprises me is the banks also do that. I think banks should stop calling people to promote their products because many cannot tell whether they’re real and this also creates scam opportunity! Don't you guys think so?

Welcome to 2012, What Are Your Resolutions?

Time flies and it has been quite some time I has not blogged about new year post since 2009. I think I should do this now because 2012 could be the last year that I can do this. Who knows the doomsday is true? I don’t want to miss the chance. :) D

You can also read my previous new year post (if you curious in my past):

• 2008 Accomplishments and What is Next?
• 2006 and 2007 Greatest Accomplishments

Top 5 Accomplishments in the Past

• Exceeded my career growth goal. Annual increment way beyond 7% annually and get promoted within 3 years to next level. Sounds good huh? But still, I”m not sure if this is a good thing because this makes me stuck even harder!

• Health has been improving. Good cholesterol (HDL) has been increasing to the normal range and no longer have high uric acid. Sounds good but still having a lot of bad cholesterol and triglycerides that out of the normal range. The fatty liver has not been fixed. Overall, I still rated myself in bad condition.

• Investment return is around 6% but good news is earn a lot of extra money from company stock options (way beyond 7%). Use the money from stock options to buy a landed property in Penang. This is something good to be an employee.

• Finished settle my housing loan in 5 years. Suppose to be a good news because free from debt. Unfortunately, this doesn’t happen because just kick off another loan account for the new house in Penang. Debt like never ending but I hope this is a good debt!

• Part time blogging gains few more readerships especially for my financial and software blogs. The traffic has been increasing (i.e. ~15%) slowly as compared to last year. The rest of my blogs are as usual, not much increasing traffic due to low quantity of content.

Top 5 Resolutions in 2012

Improve Heath

Sounds simple huh? It is not that simple because every year I have this resolution. These are the few things that I have been doing in the past 2 months and I should continue to do that:

1. Reduce meal by > 50% and eat very less meat and sugar.  
2. Exercise everyday for 1 hour

Measure of success is to fix my medical report. I should do the check up every 3 months.

Stock Investment

Study and become familiar with technical analysis. Select few companies and perform both fundamental and technical analysis on them and blog about it.

Measure of success is to have ROI > 14%.

Migration to Australia

Study and research the pros and cons of migrating to Australia. Apply for PR when the possibility to get is higher than 80%. Also, look at what are the skills that I need to acquire so that I can get a job there (assuming if I decide to migrate there). Unless there is an semi-conductor field there (but unlikely), then I will have less worry. Things still at the early stage at this point in time anyway.

Measure of success is to apply migration to Australia by end of 2012.

Setup Travel Blog

Since my life partner has been traveling to so many places, she is asking my help to setup a blog for her. I think that is a good idea too. Anyway this shouldn’t be very hard but I think the hardest part is more on the content. I will leave that to her and hopefully she is not just saying for fun. We will see…

Measure of success is to post 12 posts by end of Dec. This is the goal I set to her. lol! :)

Stretch goal: Become iOS Developer

Not sure if this is realistic or not because I have been wanting to do this for quite sometime. The thing is I need to get the Mac book air to do this which I have been unwilling to invest in the past. Also, time is another factor. That’s why I put this as a stretch goal in 2012.

Measure of success is to develop one application for iPad or iPhone by end of 2012 and get approved in “App Store”.


What are your 2012 resolutions?

Have you set your goals or resolutions yet for 2012? If you’re blogger, you may paste your link here so I will take a look at that as well. Setting goals needs to be S.M.A.R.T if you do not aware of this. The hardest part for me for setting goals is “achievable” because I usually do not accomplish all the goals I set. However, I think that’s the right way too because you do not want to achieve 100% of your goals. This basically means your goals are not challenging enough.


Please set your goals if you haven't do it. You may have different goals. For example. goals for your personal, goals for your business and goals as a employee of a company.

Wish you guys all the best and Happy New Year 2012!!