Mapletree Commercial Trust rights issue

I've been  holding MCT since IPO but I had never bought any new shares from the secondary market. Any additions to my holdings were through a previous rights issue (I think) + Scrip dividend from long ago (I think they stopped offering scrip dividend sometime back for this counter)

Results of the rights issue are in:  

806 allocated + 1839 excess rights at $2.24. Good opportunity to round up my holdings as I had odd lots from Scrip dividend.

Current price is $2.40. For some reason the price briefly dropped below the rights price but seems back to normal now. 

Regular investment beats stock picking, beats holding cash & waiting for crash?

In a recent HWZ thread, those that DCA IWDA (MSCI developed World ETF) regularly in 2019 reported a year to date 20%+ money-weighted return in their Interactive Brokers Statement. 

As I am heavily exposed to UK stocks, I had no idea whether I would be losing or making money at this stage. I decided to have a look and was pleasantly surprised that I had a year to date return in my IBKR account of 14%+. Obviously, it underperformed a broad-based ETF, but given the various UK problems, I'm glad that its still a positive return and hope there is some upside after the Dec 2019 UK elections.

I guess that I can console myself that my 14% return is still better return than all those who are holding cash and waiting for the big crash and recession of 2019 that never came (well, there's still December for crash to happen).

Dividends Collected: Oct 2019

Quiet month for S$ Dividends, but Vanguard paid out its quarterly US$ and GBP dividends in October. 

Nearing the year end, I took a look at my dividend situation in 2018. it seems that this year I am on track for a decent increase in annual dividends collected, though in % terms, the increase is likely to be smaller as the absolute amount of dividends increases.

Edit: Oct 2019 dividends collected. Missed out the $ value of OCBC scrip dividend (I chose SCRIP but reflect the dollar value of the dividedn)

Parking SRS in 2.5% endowment, but HSBC is so slow

Looking at the current market uncertainty after a small recovery, I decided to put my 2019 SRS funds into a 2.5% 3-year endowment advertised by HSBC. This is apparently the first time HSBC is entering this space. You can apply online like Singlife.

Unfortunately, as the HWZ discussion thread shows, there has been some delay in HSBC in processing the applications. Its been 2 weeks and SRS still hasn't been deducted.

When Singlife debuted their endowment plan with a promotional 3.03% rate capped at $6k, there was huge interest. Nevertheless, they processed your applications within 48 hours. Why is a huge organisation like HSBC (ok the fine print says HSBC insurance, probably a subsidiary) taking so long to process something that Singlife only took 48 hours to do?

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UPDATE: HSBC took 1 month to issue the policy. You get an e-mail of what appears to be a black and white scan of the policy. This can be compared to Singlife who issued a computer generated PDF in colour. The Singlife documents looked far more professional.

This is the first time into the online space, hope they will learn from the lesson and look forward to more policies because the rate they offered is attractive, even if the service was slow. 

Brexit deal announced with EU, Parliament not voted yet, premature rally?

I've been holding Lloyds since Brexit and it recently fell to Brexit levels. Of course my response is to buy more! 

Today, LYG back up to $3.12 while LLOY is at 61.56p after EU and UK announced a Brexit Deal. Parliament still has to vote on it if and rejected, are prices going to drop again? At this level I'm holding and not buying more. Did all my buying under $3. Bought a mixture of LLOY and LYG depending on whether I had spare US$/ GBP.

For 2019, I started buying Lloyds again in May 2019

May -  LLOY 59.43p
July  -  LLOY 52.3p
Aug  -  LLOY 49.8p / LYG $2.52 / $2.40 / $2.32  (catching the falling knife?)
Sep -   LYG  $2.63

Strategy: October 2019

I am in regular DCA mode with part of my free cash flow being diverted to warchest. ETFs are in play as a 'safer' option (i.e reduce non-systemic risk). Bought VDPX and VUKE this month.

This is a change from previous month where I used up my free cash flow to purchase equities. As the year ends, I also need to make my yearly SRS contribution and decide what to do with it. SSB 10-year rates are under 2% so it doesn't look good, on the other hand, there is no lock-in for SSB so one could switch SSBs when the time is right.

Prudential Demerger documents are out. Pru will demerge M&G. Since M&G will not be an ADR, the ADR manager will sell the M&G shares and return the cash. Prudential's dividend coverage is better than Aviva though it % yield is lower. Still an attractive buy.

Aviva remains in focus and I accumulate more this month. 

My OUEHT shares have been converted to OUECT. Next up will be my AscendasHT being converted to AscottRT due to the merger.

Dividends Collected: Sep 2019

I included the cash from the scheme of arrangement which converted OUEHT shares into OUECT shares. SIA 3.03% bonds paid their interest this month as well.