March 2020 review

I deployed quite a lot of cash and warchest in March 2020. 

I still topped up some Euro banks which have suspended dividends on regulator's advice and whose prices are plummeting (SAN, LYG, ING)

But my main focus was on ETFs and purchased reasonable amounts of VUKE, CS51, 3085.HK, 2800.HK, VDPX, WQDV in addition to STI ETF which you can see in my earlier posts.

Also added some Singtel and Capitaland.

My last STI purchase was $2.35 and I'm ready to average down. I will be surprised if STI doesn't retest the bottom and I'm looking to buy again at $2.23. I queued at $2.23 but I believe the last bottom was $2.24 so now fill. 

Somehow I think there's a chance that the bottom may hold at around $2.23 but if it doesn't, I'll still keep reserved for $2.11 and then $1.99.

Averaging down progress

Continuing to average down in 5% increments. The next leg down will be $2.24. At that point, in order to keep the dollar value of the purchase above $9k, I'll have to start buying 5,000 shares per trade instead of the current 4,000.

At the same time, I have been loading up on other ETFs such as VUKE and VDPX. Will be topping up other ETF holdings this week as well. REITs prices have really collapsed but most of them are still higher than their GFC lows. The stronger REITs have the potential to be multibaggers if bought at the correct time.

Something from the past

I am always skeptical of Friday closing prices. Dow rallied 1985 points. Unsurprisingly some people think that the market has recovered and the bear market is over, because they were still in school during the last GFC and weren't trading?

Anyway, here's a blast from the past. In Nov 2007, there was a sharp V-shaped recovery after a 20% fall in the STI. Did it mean that the coast was clear? 

I am ready to continue buying next week if the market goes down. As long as STI remains under 3,000, I can always accumulate smaller amounts while waiting for bigger moves downwards.

Continued purchasing ETFs this week, STI ETF, VDPX, WQDV, VUKE etc. My STI ETF average price is now $2.76. Looking to continue averaging down next week.

They'll be calling it Black Monday?

Until a bigger Monday fall comes along, I guess they'll call today Black Monday. Oil prices and oil majors basically collapsed. I'm sticking to strategy of ETF-only until there is a sufficient margin of safety to go individual stock picking. Bought STI ETF and VUKE today.





STI ETF
2.975 Entered
2.82   5% down
2.68   5% down

Next stop for my next big STI purchase will be $2.68. But I may buy small amounts of STI ETF 300 shares here and there using SCB while waiting.

Dividends: Feb 2020

Februrary usually skews the graph because of the dividends from STI ETF.

STI ETF under $3.00 (waiting since 2016)

I have a rule that I only buy STI ETF when it is under $3. The last time this happened was 2016 which coincidentally was the year I started this blog.

On 6 March 2020, STI ETF finally succumbed to selling pressure and went under $3. However, this was a Friday, and I'm worried about trading on Fridays because shortists are closing their shorts which may distort the market and things might happen over the weekend. 

So I'm starting small first using my CPF-OA and will start averaging down next week if the downtrend is confirmed.

Given the high volatility, I've also initiated a small position in CISCO as I'm buying into the story about video conferencing a growth industry due to the COVID19 situation.

I do not necessarily want to use all my CPF-OA warchest on STI ETF, so I'm also ready to consider adding to my CPF unit trusts in order to diversify

Then at night, I added $5k worth of VUKE. So my total opening deployment is about S$17k