It was reported that Singapore lost >SGD500m to cybercrime in 2023. Imagine, our small country of a few million people, losing that much. What would that number be in China, US and Europe? Based on population sizes, it could be 300x more ((China’s 1.3bn + US’ 300m + Europe’s 500m) / Singapore’s 6m = 300). That’s USD150bn! The company we are discussing today is one of the cybersecurity play listed in the US. Recently, the firm published some good quarterly investment materials and we shall be highlighting many of the key slides here starting the one on Total Addressable Market. The company ..read more

When we first started out a year ago, we discussed the goal to write one investment idea per month and ultimately getting to 30 ideas. Well time files and we are now at the 15th idea. This is a good one as can be seen in the numbers below (company has FY ending in Jun): Simple Financials (Jun 2024 estimate, USD) Sales: 21.0bn  EBITDA: 7.2bn  Net income: 4.5bn  FCF: 3.2bn  Debt: 19bn, Mkt Cap 84bn Financial Ratios ROIC: 13% and ROE: 40%!  EV/EBITDA 13.4x  PER 16.8x  Past margins: OPM 27-31%  FCF yield: 2.4-3.7% This is another one of the highest qu ..read more

There are two topics that dominate social conversations in Singapore. Children’s Education and Real Estate. Nothing else seemed to loom as large. In one of the earlier post on this substack, we discussed the important pieces of an investment portfolio. But we did not talk about property. Given that this would be a huge monetary outlay for most families, we believe property deserves a separate discussion. This post is an attempt to address this big topic in our lives. I have to caveat that I have not gotten it very right with Singapore property. All the posts in the original infosite detailed ..read more

Events in 2023 have prompted some initial thoughts about negotiation and how it affects the situations, our lives and the world. Life is indeed a game of chess, and we need good strategies and there is also timing, environment and our fellow community to help. Or in Chinese, 天时,地力,人和. The Russia-Ukraine war comes to mind. It was reckless to start the war and reasons back then are no longer relevant today. This is very much like life. The person we were just a few years ago, is actually not us today. Events that has happened just last year may no longer be relevant today. The Russia-Ukraine sit ..read more

Welcome to our podcast, as mentioned, we shall discuss further about the impact of inflation. Inflation is real and happening today. Everything in sunny Singapore has become a lot more expensive. Food court meals was $5 and now we have to pay $10.  The cheapest car cost almost $200,000 which is enough to buy a house in most countries. The cheapest condo... I wouldn't even want to go there.  You get the idea, inflation has taken us by storm. The hardest hit people are people in the lower income households and those with debt. Interest cost is rising and if one is not careful, one migh ..read more

This third Singapore name has been a strong compounder since its IPO c.17 years ago, almost quadrupling its share price back then. With STI barely up over the same time period, this is an idea that has worked out and I think the share price is not expensive today. As usual, the simple financial numbers below: Simple financials (Sep 2024 estimate, SGD) Sales: 11.7bn EBITDA: 1.9bn Net income: 1.2bn FCF: 1.5bn Debt: 4.7bn, Mkt Cap 25.1bn Financial Ratios ROIC: 10% and ROE: 16% EV/EBITDA 11.4x (Sep 24) PER 11.5x (Sep 24) Past margins: OPM 12-14% FCF yield: high single digit for last few years ..read more

This is a collaboration post with Globe Newswire which provides earnings update and salient financial news globally. Please click on the links after the introductory excerpts for their full articles. TORONTO, Dec. 19, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- As a result of increasing restrictions on liberties in Hong Kong—once among the freest places on earth—it now ranks 46th in the latest Human Freedom Index report, released today by Canada’s Fraser Institute and the U.S.-based Cato Institute. As recently as 2010, Hong Kong was the 3rd freest jurisdiction on earth. Mainland China has always been less free ..read more

This post first appeared on http://8percentpa.substack.com Happy New Year! We shall start 2024 with a deep dive into this company! This company is not our typical strong financials, high ROE and high margin company. Its net income is barely positive and this makes the Price Earnings Ratio (PER) and Return on Equity (ROE) numbers look erratic. But FCF generation is strong and growing which makes the stock worth looking at. Again, let’s start with the financials.  Simple financials (Dec 2023, USD) Sales: 19.1bn EBITDA: 1.7bn Net income: 0.2bn FCF: 1.0bn Debt: 4.9bn, Mkt Cap 20.4bn Ratios ..read more

2023 is coming to an end. It has been a tumultuous year with two major conflicts, blowups in the China property market and crypto going all rollercoaster. Depending on your starting point, you could have made or lost a lot. That's just investing, it's just so tough. But at the same time, regular mom and pops are having the best year in a long while just by putting money in fixed deposits and T-bills. As of this writing, we can still get 3.8% return on the SGD! Pls do not understand 3.8%. Over time, it will still return multiple folds. Based on the table below, very roughly speaking, 3.8% retur ..read more

This article was first posted on 8percentpa.substack.com. There is an interesting book published in 2020 called the Psychology of Money written by Morgan Housel who was a financial analyst and fund manager. He wrote about simple strategies and how wealth is best compounded over time. There is no need to complicate things and most importantly, we need to just save up and invest simply - like buying the S&P500. Then time will take care of everything else. "Warren Buffett is a phenomenal investor. But you miss a key point if you attach all of his success to investing acumen. The real key ..read more