Robinhood's IPO | How they changed trading/investing

Robinhood has been the trading platform being mentioned in many news as it attracts youths to create accounts with value as low as $100 which traditional banks/brokerages do not accept as customers. Robinhood actually filed for IPO on March 2021 and is said to go public in July 2021.

So before we talk more about it, let's find out more about Robinhood. It was founded by 2 Stanford graduates Vlad Tenev and Baiju Bhatt.I have seen Vlad Tenev appear in numerous videos especially after the GME saga where trading was halt and they had to explain why it happened. Robinhood was created in 2013 starting as an app for tracking stocks but was soon pushed out by Yahoo and Google finance so they pivoted into a brokerage after receiving some funding.

The pandemic pushed Robinhood into the limelight (nuggets from the video)

What Robinhood provided was the ease of creating an account to trade or invest where every aspect of the app was created to make the experience exciting from the fonts to being able to slide your finger across the graph and see the prices update. It attracted many users as the criteria to join was easily fulfilled and setting up was simple. It was mentioned in the video that even today with it's popularity, the median account size was $240 (USD) and in 2019, they had about 10 million customers.

One other attractive point besides the user experience and low criteria to start an account is the commission-free trading. I mean there has been a rise in low cost trading platform but Robinhood is definitely one of pioneers of it. The pandemic accelerated the growth of Robinhood as most people had to stay home where there was a surge of interest in investing. With these large numbers of sign ups, Robinhood had to find a way to monetise.

With social media platforms like Twitter, Reddit and Tiktok, the spread of information can go far and strong. With Robinhood collating the list of highly traded stocks combined with communities discussing on stocks, the young generation can invest at the snap of a finger unlike our parents where investing involves a broker and usually requires some time. In the past, offices in Wall Street run on news or what we call narratives (memes now) by passing on rumours on the next big stock and news only was in Wall Street over the phone but now, social media platforms allows such information to spread.

Short sellers and I really "like" the stock

Robinhood is a platform for retail investors to easily buy what they want without having too many criteria to fulfil. I am sure short selling, GME and AMC has been covered quite extensively so I won't go too deep into it but when Melvin Capital, a hedge fund lost billions after the epic squeeze by Reddit traders, the retail investors knew they have managed to find a way to go against the institutions who have all along been using ways to earn their share. And also bailing out themselves during times of crisis like the 2008 financial crisis where institutions could pay a fine while retail investors lost their lifetime savings or are required to pay for what the financial institutions caused.

All went well until Robinhood tweeted,"In light of current market volatility, we are restricting transactions for certain securities to position closing only, including AMC and GME." This means that you can only sell your stocks but couldn't buy more. This of course triggered anger among it's users who were a huge following against the hedge funds and not being able to buy was like stopping them in their fight against the institutions.

My Thoughts:

Robinhood actually had a pretty good reputation originally for the ease of using and onboarding, I am sure many who wanted to start investing created an account with them. However, after the GME and AMC buying halt by them, it was seen as a huge hit to their reputation as conspiracy theories that hedge funds were the ones who asked them to halt trading but Vlad clarified that it was entirely about market dynamics and clearing house deposit requirements as per regulations.

Robinhood still remains the easiest brokerage to onboard in the United States and I am sure many people are looking out for it's IPO. It also allows cryptocurrencies to be bought which is really convenient because you can have all your stocks and cryptocurrencies in one place. Although it is easy to onboard into Robinhood, they do have certain restrictions, for example, if you were to buy cryptocurrencies using Robinhood, you are not able to transfer it anywhere else. This makes you lose out in terms of interest and also safety as your cryptocurrencies depend a lot on Robinhood's infrastructure. All in all, it will be interesting to look out for the IPO but I will not be initiating any position on it. Hope you guys enjoy the content. Mid year portfolio review coming soon.

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References: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AHmJraM8Lw
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/25/robinhood-nears-biggest-trade-of-all-an-ipo-after-wild-year.html
https://www.investopedia.com/assessing-the-robinhood-ipo-5187047
https://sg.news.yahoo.com/robinhood-ceo-refutes-game-stop-hedge-fund-conspiracy-theory-and-reveals-what-actually-happened-234600703.html

Fear of averaging up or down on my stocks?

Hi Guys, welcome back to another episode of SingaporeanTalksMoney. Do hit the like button and subscribe to my channel for updates on my investing journey. Let's start with today's topic, do you have a fear of averaging up your stocks, I do.

Recently, I released an article/video on my Tesla stocks journey and how it became 30% of my stock portfolio as I slowly added more shares. Of course, as I added more Tesla shares as it's price went up, it also brought my average price up. I was actually originally against adding more shares as the price was increasing because it would raise my average price substantially. But I realised eventually that if you believe the company will do well in the future, what's stopping you from getting more of it as it grows?

For me, it definitely worked well in the beginning stages as Tesla stock price ran up due to lots of positive news surrounding it and averaging up seems to be a good decision as the stock prices goes higher even after I average up.

Recently though, with lots of FUD surrounding Tesla and Elon Musk himself being very active on Twitter regarding cryptocurrencies, although that might not be the main causes but the stock price have been hovering between $500 - $600 plus and having some difficulty breaking $700. However, I still find Tesla a company that is innovating and putting a lot of effort into the production of their EVs. Stock price does not always reflect the performance of the business.

Why you should not be afraid to average up

There are other stocks where I regretted not averaging up more like SGX and OCBC where I averaged up 2 or 3 times mainly due to a lack of funds or just being too cautious. For my RSP, I have been averaging up on Vanguard Total World Stock Index Fund ETF (VT) mainly through DCA, I started a few months after the pandemic and started buying in at prices of USD60 then 70, 80, 90 and now it is at about $100. Of course, when I first started the RSP, the amount I put in was low but I absolutely do not regret averaging up although it is through dollar cost averaging as you can see from the image.

It might be an attractive strategy to keep track and get in a rising momentum or when you believe the stock price will rise in the long term although your average price increases. Many companies have done well over the past year as seen in the growth of S&P 500. If you are averaging up, it means the stock price is going up, which is good. For me, to average down is also an equally difficult task, of course if you have done your research and know that the downward trend is due to FUD (Fear, uncertainty and doubt) or due to short term news/environment then it's easy to average down. Averaging up or averaging down does not always turn out good and definitely do carry some risks with it like if the share price continues to drop suddenly or sharply after the uptrend and does not recover.

Average up and average down

In contrast to averaging up, averaging down is something that more people talk about. When you "like" a company and it's stock price drops, will you grab more? For me, yes if I have sufficient cash on hand as I have so for Tesla in the past 2 months. To be honest, I might not always have the courage to average down and it really depends on what company you are talking about. Overall, I think it is difficult to time the market and as they always say, "Time in market beats timing the market." I am also definitely holding my portfolio for the long term although I am sure we are going to be expecting lots of volatility and exciting news in the coming months and years.

Whether it is to average up or average down your position in a certain stock requires a certain amount of conviction but in the long term, time in the market beats timing the market so stay invested and hold a long term view. Hope you guys enjoy today's video/article and give me some support by following, subscribing and like my videos! Next up will be my mid year portfolio update.

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 References:
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/a/averageup.asp
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/a/averagedown.asp
https://insideevs.com/news/516187/tesla-model3-modely-sold-q3/
https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/tesla-launch-high-end-model-s-plaid-fend-off-mercedes-porsche-2021-06-10/

Low Desire Generation - Surviving on $520 per month

Shared an article on the concept of 躺平, Lie Flat recently and to further talk about it, I came across a video on Hong Kong where they call a group of people low desire generation where they don't buy a house, don't get married and don't have kids.

It starts with a professor explaining the rise of the low desire generation where he explains it as, "We are not able to see a future and everyone's mentality is very panicky or low not like during the earlier years where people are willing to work hard, climb the ranks and have a better tomorrow. From the year of desires dropping to low desires, it could be due to the sudden shrinking in terms of financials or the surroundings."

This professor himself is now a full-time volunteer now and also lives a low desire life with his expenses per month not exceeding HKD3000 which is around SGD520. He thinks the main rise of the low desire generation is because the young people or youths are unable to see their future eg. how will a young person ever be able to purchase a property in Hong Kong currently? Almost zero chance as the prices are so high.

Read more: The Art of Frugal Hedonism | Positioning your life the right way

Desire to buy and spend

What's interesting in the video is that the reporter, Sam also tries surviving with HKD3000 a month however he lives pay cheque to pay cheque and normally doesn't think twice before making his purchases. He finds that he is spending money to turn it into something he likes through purchasing items. The video shows his spending habits, from buying 2 afternoon tea sets to having bubble tea 3 or 4 times a week and even getting an expensive pen as a gift, you guess it, he couldn't keep to the HKD3000 budget. He ends it off by saying he has huge desires and only after spending is he able to think about saving.

Low Desire Generation - Andy

Andy, age 24 who identifies as having a low desire for things where similarly he spends about HKD3000 monthly. For the last 24 years, he hasn't travelled, dated, didn't go to university because he finds that in the society whether you work hard or cruise through, the ending is the same.

He doesn't like to trouble others and tries to do things by himself, he also finds himself having a low desire for possession of items compared to others. After graduating from secondary school, he started working with a starting salary of HKD11,000 (roughly SGD1906) and after 6 years, he is currently earning HKD 15,000 (roughly SGD2600). He goes on to share that the older generation might see him as being not motivated but honestly if he is not amazing/special, whatever he does is difficult to change his current situation. With his low desire habits and high savings rate, he has managed to saved about HKD 800,000 (roughly SGD 139,000). That is quite a substantial amount however the money was used to help a family member's business and wiped off just like that. Of course, during festive seasons like Christmas, he feels lonely and bored. He has one primary goal which is to get a property in HK but he knows it's tough.

Low Desire Generation - Wallace

Wallace, born in the 1970s chose to quit his well-paying job and move to Cheung Chau, an island 10 kilometres southwest of Hong Kong Island. He is a baker now and earns lesser but his work life balance currently is what he enjoys. His previous jobs had odd hours leading him to being unhealthy and after he moved to the island, he is feeling much healthier.

Read more: The more you earn, the happier you are? | Does your salary determine your happiness level?

My thoughts

I think having low desires can be seen as a phenomena happening especially so in Asia like Japan and Hong Kong as minimalism is also catching on. Physical possessions don't seem to matter as much, it could partly be due to the rising cost of living. Of course, there is a huge difference between Andy and Wallace, Andy seems to not interact much and only travels around his neighbourhood for food, work and leisure. In the long term, it might not be good for him mentally as he might feel lonely and not fulfilled. On the hand, Wallace seems to interact well with his neighbours and the community loves his bread which he also mentions is a bridge between him and the people.

Physical possessions don't matter much but emotionally, we need to have a support system and cutting out gatherings or interactions shouldn't be the case even if you are aiming for minimalism or low desire. There are also definitely a huge proportion of youths who have a high desire for purchases, there is definitely a spectrum ranging from low to high desires but I do feel the rise of low desire among my friends as essentials are purchased and other than that, they occasionally indulge during special occasions. It is a really good video as we catch a glimpse of those living in Hong Kong although the video only presents us with 3 examples. The low desire generation might also have been created because of the effects of the pandemic and there is no choice but to gravitate towards it. What are some of your thoughts after watching the video? Hope you guys found this informative.

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References: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPdpjtJJA9E

Loving your meme stocks? Let's take a look at BUZZ ETF and FOMO ETF

So this week, I released an article based on an article from Bloomberg titled: The FOMO economy: Is everyone making money except you? It mentioned that the BUZZ ETF and FOMO ETF were both created due to this new trend of meme stocks or social sentiment where communities rally together to bring a stock up or down. Lets explore a little more into each.

Buzz ETF (VanEck Vectors Social Sentiment ETF)

For the BUZZ ETF, it was created on 2 March 2021 which is rather recent and the issuer is VanEck hence the full name is VanEck Vectors Social Sentiment ETF and listed as BUZZ. It has about 75 holdings/companies in it which we will look through in awhile.

VanEck Vectors Social Sentiment ETF (BUZZ) seeks to track, as closely as possible, before fees and expenses, the price and yield performance of the BUZZ NextGen AI US Sentiment Leaders Index (BUZZTR), which is intended to track the performance of the 75 large cap U.S. stocks which exhibit the highest degree of positive investor sentiment and bullish perception based on content aggregated from online sources including social media, news articles, blog posts and other alternative datasets.

-There are many familiar companies in the top 10 holdings (*Holdings are accurate as of 16 June 2021, there are some changes to the current holdings as below where it has been updated on 17 June 2021)

Looking at the white paper ( a report to inform readers concisely about a complex matter) of BUZZ ETF, it is really quite engaging and you can see it really trying to relate to the masses by bringing a lot of data about social media in. It starts out with a great title: Join the Swarm Invest in the Power of Collective Conviction

It opens up first by writing how sentiments drives the market, just like previous bubbles where sentiments have been described in a negative light but in recent years especially after the pandemic hit, technology has helped us to stay connected, collaborate and share investment ideas.

FOMO ETF

FOMO ETF is even younger than BUZZ and was created in 25 May 2021. It is a fund managed by the Tuttle Capital Management and is listed on BATS Global Markets. The fund name as you expected is called The Fear of Missing Out ETF, expense ratio is pretty high at 0.90%. The principal investment strategy un like social sentiment which is based on social media platforms, FOMO ETF uses informed agility where they can navigate through the turbulent times we currently face. Another strategy is that they cut through the chatter and market noise to focus on the "important" news.

FOMO would make you think that the top 10 holdings will be more on stocks that have experienced parabolic growth over time however the holdings do show otherwise as we see companies like Walmart, CVS, home depot and Citibank (*Holding accurate as of 15 June 2021).

What place do these stocks have in your portfolio?

These ETFs have arise because investing for the new generation has changed as focus is more hyper growth rather than value investing. Innovation and new ideas are really the way companies can differentiate themselves. Of course, if you are thinking of making a quick buck or to invest in companies based on social sentiment, there is a larger amount of risk involved. So definitely, I would always first look at my risk profile, portfolio size before deciding if I will buy into stocks based on social sentiments. This way of managing risk definitely wouldn't make me a millionaire in the short run but at least I am putting my money based on other's opinions. Looking at S&P 500 growth, I would think that fundamentally if you stayed the course, you would still have experienced quite a nice growth. It is really interesting as we start investing and finding out that there are so many new and indigenous ways that can bring us wealth. Hope you guys find this article/video informative. Stay safe and well.

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References: 

https://etfdb.com/etf/BUZZ/#etf-ticker-profile
https://www.vaneck.com/us/en/investments/social-sentiment-etf-buzz/holdings/ https://www.vaneck.com/buzz/buzz-whitepaper.pdf
https://fomoetf.com/

The FOMO economy: Is everyone making money except you? | Thoughts on an article from Bloomberg

Some reflections on this article I came across while scrolling through social media, I  related to the title of the article and it attracted me to take a closer look at it. I do feel that investing is being "stuffed" into everyone's face nowadays, as staying home and the rise of brokerages that promote gamification or make investing look/feel like a game is getting more popular.

As news on meme stocks and cryptocurrencies appear frequently, examples of people 1000X and even becoming millionaires explodes on both social and news platforms. It seems that as long as you invest, you are bound to profit as communities are formed around these investments.

I consider myself to be rather risk-adverse which explains why my portfolio has not exploded in size. I like to make sure things are more or less secure before putting money in and if not small amount of money in as I do not have a large income. Seeing news of dogecoin millionaires and how so many millennials have become millionaires through cryptocurrencies does make me FOMO and think, "Wow, that could have been me if I had invested that sum in." But to be honest, would I even dare to invest $100,000 into dogecoin at a time when it wasn't mainstream/popular yet? I don't think I would and also because currently, I do not have $100,000 yet.

How I feel about FOMO

It is easy to feel affected as you see other gain their wealth in such a short amount of time with stocks or cryptocurrencies that you have all along knew but lacked the conviction or sum of money to go all in! This is definitely because what we see is the ending, the part where the individuals are successful in multiplying their capital. But I am sure that there are many much more cases where individuals have lost much more by dumping in due to FOMO. Some say to stay away from social media but I do think at times, staying away from some news outlets are also necessary as they tend to do up clickbait articles that show you all the get rich formulas which could really go 2 ways.

Nuggets from the article (Quotes/Paragraph from article)

This Bloomberg business article might be the news that I should stay away from but there are nuggets of it which I find a good read. One such paragraph is the one below.

"Today, a new generation of stock traders has known market crashes only as short-lived dip-buying opportunities, leading to a record rise in brokerage account openings."

I really relate to this because I started investing in 2018 which means I haven't experienced a crash as bad as the 2007-2009 Financial Crisis. The worse I have been through would have to be the COVID-19 dip which occurred around Feb/March 2020 but even then, the effects of that dip was short and the markets even recovered to hit ATH (all time highs after) and it is still alive. Sense of looming danger, no risk protection.

"People flush with pent-up savings after a year of lockdowns have more ways than ever to throw darts at the financial dartboard: zero-commission, zero-minimum trading apps; social media message boards; and exchange-traded funds you can hop in and out of as easily as stocks, including a few that explicitly play to the trend-chasing crowd with such tickers as BUZZ and, yes, FOMO."

This is rather true to a certain extent, having stimulus money and cash saved aside from not travelling and having to stay at home, most of my peers have seen their savings increase during this period. And when you are exposed to information of people having their money 100X or multiply within such a short period of time, it's easy to feel like you are missing out on the gains.

"The pandemic has accelerated a feeling of helplessness alongside technological disruption and euphoria at the possibility of huge returns—rather like the dot-com boom, when the internet was understood less in technological terms than as a powerful story."

It can really go anywhere from here, I would say that current sentiments towards investing seems positive as most people would have made some gains from it. Even if they have not, there are various communities and forums that push this idea to HODL and that it will eventually turn grow to ATH. But I mean you really never know what's gonna happen next, a trigger is all it takes to send the market crashing.

My thoughts

For me, working from home for an extended period of time, it seems like the stock market is the most interesting thing in my life especially when the heightened measures were introduced. Friends and family gatherings were reduced and there's really not much except to eat, sleep, work, watch drama and repeat. So going online to Reddit and reading post on how others managed to increase their investments does affect you in a way, of course, I tell myself that I know I won't be able to handle the risks but I mean just thinking about if I managed to strike that pot of gold, how am I going to spend it?

Another thing is how I am watching more youtube videos than ever (plug for my own channel as well) but it seems that people have huge amount of money to invest while I wait patiently each month to save before being able to invest. It does feel like I am complaining haha but what I want to put across is really that we only see the successful cases where they managed to increase their portfolio by taking a larger than normal risks or putting in a huge amount of capital hence making their gains being more substantial. Happy investing and hope you guys enjoyed this article!

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 References: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-06-10/is-everyone-making-money-but-you-the-fomo-economy-of-memes-crypto-housing

My Tesla Journey | How it became the largest holding in my portfolio

Tesla is a hugely discussed stock as the parabolic climb of it's stock price have made some to call it overvalued while some say it is undervalued and has huge potential. I am of course holding a few shares and I do hope that it is undervalued. On twitter, I follow Tesla analysts and enthusiasts who share an amazing load of information as well as individuals who report on Tesla's news. I do see the huge potential in it's EV business as it is currently the biggest electric vehicle manufacturers in the world. Besides dabbling in EVs, battery and solar power are also industries that Tesla has set foot and is revolutionizing.

My Tesla Journey

I actually started the journey in June 2020 with one stock, yup how I wished I had bought more during then. That 1 share became 5 shares (average of USD197) and Tesla also got included into the S&P 500 after some time. Along the way, I read up more and realised that it is a really huge potential company we are looking at.

As my savings rate was not high and I had a RSP in place, I bought shares every few months and even consecutively during it's highs of $800 as the stock market was at that time really rising as most growth stocks broke ATH (all time highs). From the image, you can see that I still bought in 2 shares even when it was at USD870, it was shocking when the price dropped to USD600+ and even $500+. As of now, my average price of each Tesla share is at USD504.23 after including fees.

Taking the DCA approach but losing money on fees

From the above diagram, it definitely show that I took a dollar cost averaging approach and because of that, I had some amount of fees being chalked up though the profits are much more when you consider my average price being USD504.23

The total price paid for my Tesla shares is USD9,494.66 but after including fees, it is USD$9,580.43, almost a $100 difference. This is because I originally used FSMone to buy which charges about USD 9.42 per transaction and I slowly moved to tiger brokers where there is free or a low commission charge. Overall, I will still be adding Tesla into my portfolio along the way as I managed to buy some during the correction recently. But I will be building up my funds before getting in. Tesla is a long term hold for me and I am really excited on how they will progress and innovate. Most of my losses from my SG stocks were reversed by the gains from Tesla and it slowly grew as I added on more. It now takes up about 30% of my portfolio.

I still believe in index investing (VT) because I have seen how horrible I am at individual stock picking when I invested in the SG markets but Tesla is one company that I do not mind putting more money in. Hope you guys enjoy today's video, do comment below on anything that you would like me to know. Thank you!

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An Interest Account for your Cryptocurrencies | Earn up to 10.5% APY | Why I have decided to move my crypto

*This is a sponsored posts and affiliate links are given where I will earn a commission if you choose to sign up using my link. I am currently using Hodldnaut and if you use this link, you will get a USD$20 bonus upon a deposit of USD$1000 and the equivalent of crypto.

New Update: Hodlnaut now offers a new listing, WBTC with an APY of 6.2%totalling up to 6 offerings also, users can earn up to 7.5% BTC and up to 12.7% on stablecoins. More details: https://www.hodlnaut.com/press/hodlnaut-tiered-interest-rates

Yup, I know I am late to the game, almost everyone has been earning interest on their cryptocurrencies with some being pretty substantial due to the sheer size of their positions. If you have seen my previous articles, I keep a major earlier portion of my cryptocurrencies in a cold wallet with the rest on the exchange (Binance.sg) which I DCA a small amount (just a few hundreds monthly). Since the amount on the exchange has grown a little, I am moving them to earn interest on it.

Read more: Ledger Nano S Review, Set-up and Price | Why I got a cold wallet for my crypto

Hodlnaut

I have heard of many platforms providing interest on your cryptocurrencies. Recently, Hodlnaut reached out to me and I have heard of them before, being a Singapore-based company, naturally I was interested in them and because I have seen other bloggers who have opened account with them like betterspider and turtleinvestor.

Setting up of account

It was a breeze setting up the account where they require your NRIC/ID photos and then a statement with your address on it. Verification was quick and I got verified within a day.

Transferring your holdings over

I transferred my ETH holdings from Binance.sg over to hodlnaut.com via the withdrawal in Binance.sg, it took about 15 minutes for the transaction to take place. It was relatively smooth where on hodlnaut.com, you can easily copy your specific address for each crypto and paste it to Binance or whatever exchange that you are using.

Please do remember to always double check the address you are sending to and to ensure that the crypto you are sending over matches the address. It was pretty fuss-free. Currently, my ETH holdings are earning interest and the simple interface really attracts me where in the homepage, you can see the interest you are earning where the amount updates every second so that keeps excited! Scrolling down will bring you to where you can see your holding and also the interest rates that are being paid for each assets. Finally at the bottom, you can see the transactions that you have done.

Interest Rates

As you can see, the interest rates are pretty attractive if you compare them to the traditional banks. Let's take the 2 most common cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin and Ether, you can earn 6.0% APR and 6.5% APR, although the interest rates are subjected to change. To also clarify on APY, or annual percentage yield, takes into account compound interest, whereas APR, which stands for annual percentage rate does not take into account compound interest.

Some information that you would like to be aware of

I am sure most people will be interested in how they afford to pay the interest, they lend out the assets that they have to established financial institutions who pays them interest where they take a portion for revenue and depending on supply and demand, they give the remaining to the users like us.

Hodlnaut currently does not support buying and selling of any crypto through their platform meaning that you will need to transfer your crypto assets in to start earning interest but just like how turtleinvestor mentioned, using anyone's referral link should allow you to get a USD$20 if you deposit USD$1000 equivalent of crypto into your account which will allow your withdrawal fees to be covered depending on the withdrawal fees you have.

Security is definitely a huge thing and you can see from the FAQs that Hodlnaut really tries to address queries on it as much as possible. As per their FAQ, it mentions that the platform runs on a secure cloud infrastructure on AWS, and all traffic is encrypted with SSL encryption. Of course, there are risks in putting your asset out for lending especially in the volatile crypto market.

Once again, if you would like to sign up for an account via my link, just click on the image below where you will get a USD$20 bonus upon a deposit of USD$1000 and the equivalent of crypto.

Affiliate links/Codes:

► How I Protect My Crypto (20% discount code): http://ledger.refr.cc/Singaporeantalkmoney
► Get USD20 equivalent for your initial deposit of at least USD1000 on any of the supported asset: https://app.hodlnaut.com/signup?r=_JF037Nb0
► Where I Buy my Cryptocurrencies (Binance.sg): Referral ID = 350349
► Where I Buy my Cryptocurrencies : Coinhako
► Where I buy my stocks

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Concept of 躺平, Lie Flat | Have you been getting enough rest?

Came across an article by BBC which wrote about this concept that has been going around in China. It is the concept of 躺平 which means to lie flat in English. Interesting concept, as it brings up the tough work conditions and what exactly are the young people working so hard for at the expense of their health.

Why this concept arises in China

So first to understand how this whole concept came about, China has actually been facing a shrinking labour force and jobs are relatively very competitive as well where a recent article also went viral showing a student who graduated from the prestigious Tsinghua University worked as a high paying nanny/home tutor. Although every job should be treated with diginity, netizens were confused why she chose to be a nanny although the pay is a huge factor as they are paid quite substantial.

Even with a shrinking labour force, the number of university graduates in China has increased year on year over the past two decades. This proves the difficulty to find a job where a lab technician mentioned that, "Sending resumes was like fishing for a needle in the ocean" as he had to look for available job openings to apply to. Proving to be a tough journey right from the beginning, many fresh graduates just want a job to cruise through where there are times for them to rest and time to work.

Another huge factor pushing this concept of 躺平 is most definitely the "996 working hour system" where some companies expect their staff to work from 9am to 9pm for 6 days and some even 7 days per week. Yup, there are only 7 days per week. The amount of cases of death from overworking has also been concerning. And what makes it more atrocious is that the companies pay no attention to this 996 system which is causing harm to it's employees.

The idea behind "tang ping" - not overworking, being content with more attainable achievements and allowing time to unwind - has been praised by many and inspired numerous memes. It has been described as a spiritual movement.

What I think about this concept

I think burnout has become more evident in the world as companies strive for efficiency in this competitive environment. Work seems to revolve around data and how many things you can solve and how are you proving your worth. Company culture still matters but engagement has dropped especially since the pandemic and close physical interactions has been minimised. Working from home means you are available 24/7 and I would say my current position is comfortable, I do get my weekends and sufficient rest every night.

I really cannot imagine a high stress environment coupled with 996 system although I know many people work these conditions. Some find it okay as long as they are well-compensated but there are many cases where compensation is seemingly little. This is a good concept, some times in life, you just need to lay flat and let your body rest.

Rest is necessary to go further and in the article, it also mention about how along with the original Tieba post, the Douban group has since been deleted, and searches for the hashtag #TangPing have been banned on Sina Weibo in an apparent effort by censors to prevent people seeing the scale of the new trend. I think all in all, just like how we always look forward to the weekends or whether PM Lee is going to wearing pink, having some form of entertainment based on our real lives is great and especially so when people relate to you. Have you guys been resting well? Do hit the like button and subscribe to my channel for more content.

References:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-57348406
https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/social-welfare/article/3135239/top-chinese-university-graduate-working-domestic
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/996_working_hour_system

Affiliate links/Codes:

► How I Protect My Crypto (20% discount code): http://ledger.refr.cc/Singaporeantalkmoney
► Get USD20 equivalent for your initial deposit of at least USD1000 on any of the supported asset: https://app.hodlnaut.com/signup?r=_JF037Nb0
► Where I Buy my Cryptocurrencies (Binance.sg): Referral ID = 350349
► Where I Buy my Cryptocurrencies : Coinhako
► Where I buy my stocks

• FSMone: P0364886
• Tiger Brokers: https://www.tigersecurities.com/accounts/signup?invite=NI8KKM
  

AMC short squeeze to $1000?

One news dominated the week and it's definitely none other than AMC. Known as one of the meme stocks which also includes GameStop, AMC has grown exponentially this week due to the same but also other reasons as well. Today, let's talk about the reasons causing the short squeeze and exponential growth, whether it is still a good time to put your money in and where will it go from here. I previously did a video where I mentioned I bought AMC. I actually set a sell order at USD26 hence it was sold off and I am officially now a paper hander.

Read more: Why emotions can kill your gains from investing | I bought AMC and Apheria at a high | Losses so far

 

Hedge funds

So the original narrative causing this parabolic growth still stays which is to edge out and cause the hedge funds who have been shorting this stock to lose money as the price of the stock increases and they will have to cover their positions.

You can see from the 1 year chart, 6 months, 3 months and even 1 month that the growth has been up, up and away. I did mentioned previously that I bought like 2 shares of AMC, I put a sell order at $26 hence it was done and sold.

Should you still put your money in?

I mean most people who will put their money in usually mention about the cause of putting it in, it is one of the most direct way of showing the institutions, the power of retail investors. Because the institutions have overly shorted stocks in a way that is ridiculous. I mean no one can really advise you whether you should be investing your money in it and especially from a paper hand like me, I don't think you should listen to me. But if you extra cash lying around and you are not hard up for it to be profitable. After all, you will be in the best community ever and go down in history as someone who fought with the hedgies.

No, I am joking, again to emphasise like always, invest with money that you can afford to lose and investing with the mindset of doubling or tripling your money is like gambling which is highly not recommended.

AMC to the 🚀

As of 3 June 2021, AMC is priced at USD65.22 per share which is 🤯 mind-blowing. I have to say that AMC is very good in engaging their retail investors as they are rewarding their retail investors through a special websites where they can get free popcorn and also exclusive viewings to certain movies. This definitely creates some form of novelty to holding the stock and I think it's a super great initiative especially for those in the US as it can provide more business opportunities as the audience will go to the theatres to redeem the rewards.

AMC has also sold some of their shares (8.5 million) where it plans to use the proceeds for "the pursuit of value creating acquisitions of theatre assets and leases, as well as investments to enhance the consumer appeal of its theatres." AMC said it will also look for opportunities to reduce debt which I think is great. AMC is certainly taking steps to improve it's position using the power that the retail investors have given it.

Where will it go from here?

*Before proceeding, I have to say that this is just opinions on my end, I am not a financial advisor and in no way should you take this seriously. I also have no position in AMC.

To be honest, now is the time when people who have no AMC shares to feel a little FOMO, I mean the share price has gone up like a rocket and if this is the case, I would think that there will be no problem with the stock prices hitting $100. Basically, if you see the upward trend, it is pretty strong but we definitely do not know when will it die down and I think the crucial point of this is when did you enter, your entry price and when will you get out. These are what you will need to plan before initiating a position unless you really are all in against the hedgies and profit or loss does not matter to you. Hope you guys enjoy today's video, do hit the like button and subscribe to my channel for more content! 

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