Barely one month after I crossed the hundred thousand networth threshold, my networth has taken a hit and is not below the two hundred thousand mark.

I advocate the advise of “put all your eggs into a few basket and watch them carefully”. I have put all my eggs into a single stock. Unfortunately, this company has performed badly in the last quarter and the stock has taken a beating since it released its latest quarterly earnings.

So, if I put my eggs into few baskets, then my portfolio will have higher risk. If I spread my eggs into many baskets, then the risk is lower but I would also have less chances to outperform the market.

And, how do I prevent this bad experience from happening again in the future?

I’ve achieved in accumulating my 2nd hundred thousand. However, the volatility of the stock market in recent weeks mean that my achievement could be short lived.

I reckon out of my 2nd RM100k, as much as MR45k is contributed by gains in my stock holding plus a little bit of dividends.

Let’s wait and see how the debt crisis in Europe plays out.

I closed my futures trading account last month. It was getting difficult to interpret the FBM KLCI trend. The best times to start trading futures is at the beginning of a bull or bear market, not now when the market is trending sideways.

Happy Birthday! Today is my birthday. I have turned 32 now. I know I haven’t blogged for 2 months now. So, here’s a quick update.

Bought my first investment property

I have bought an office unit. I’m so excited at the thought of me becoming a landlord. Buying a property is not as easy as I thought. I made a downpayment in Dec 2009, and until today my lawyer is still finalising the terms with the seller. I hope this deal could be completed quickly, so I can start earning rental income.

Busy with work

I have been drafted into a project with my company. The duration of the project is about a year. I have to travel quite a bit and I have to put in some time commitment. But the experience is worth it. It’ll expand my career options and enhancing my value as an employee. Only then will I be able to justify a higher salary.

Talking about higher salary, there’s been a lot of publicity lately regarding moving towards a high-income economy. The New Economic Model (aka NEM) is to bring us from the current per capita income of USD7,600 to between USD15,000 to USD20,000 by the year 2020. This is an increase of between 7% to 12% per year, for the next 10 years. Does this mean that my salary increment should be at least 7% to 12% just to keep up with the national average income increment?

I’ll try to blog more often, if I’m not busy with work

Have a good weekend.

I know I should have posted this earlier, but today’s still January, the first month of the year

My investment Returns.

So, I started investing about 14 months ago. How’s my performance for 2009?
Stocks: Including capital gains and dividends, my stock has produced a great 17% return.
Futures: I’ve net about 10% gain from my trading with futures contract.
Unit Trust: I took out money from my EPF to buy Unit Trust. So far, my UT has produced a 7% returns for me.

Goals for 2009.

1. Save RM65k in CD by Feb 2009. This amount is allocated the down payment for buying property. (Achieved: Feb 2009)

2. Buy insurance by Mar 2009 in anticipation of buying a property in May 2009. (Not achieved. There was a couple of times I participated in auction properties but I was outbid. It is not easy to find a good property with discount even in the midst of an economic recession. I have therefore changed my strategy. Instead of looking for properties with at least 20% discount from their fair value, I am not looking at the cashflow instead. As long as the rental income is able to pay for all the expenses associated with the property, then it’s a buy.)

3. Earn a side income of RM6,000/mth by Apr 2009. (Not achieved.)

4. Buy a property in May 2009. (Not achieved.)

5. Earn a side income of RM8,000/mth by Jul 2009. Quit my job once this threshold is achieved. (Not achieved. Glad I’m still keeping my job)

6. Side income of RM10,000/mth by Oct 2009. (Not achieved.)

7. Trade up the value of my stock portfolio from RM8k to RM16k. (This is debatable. I have unrealised gain of more than 8k. But if strictly referring to “trading”, then I made a trading loss instead of a trading gain.)

Highlights of 2009.

1. Achieved my RmM100,000 networth.

2. Invest in unit trusts using money from EPF.

3. Started trading with futures.

New Goals for 2010.

1. Accumulate my second RM100,000 net worth.

2. Buy a commercial property, ASAP.

3. Side income, target RM1,000 a month, from various sources but excluding the rental income from (2).