An update with what is in my stock portfolio? | 69% in QQQ...

I have covered my portfolio in quarterly updates but not really on the composition or what is the updated position except that I have Tesla. I wanted to record how the stock portfolio is looking in 2024 and compare it in the years to come to see if there will be any changes. Numbers are accurate as of 13 April 2024.

QQQ

Yes, the beautiful QQQ, it has grown pretty well this year with the AI rise, QQQ comprises a higher proportion of tech companies and places a larger emphasis on a selectively few so it has performed relatively well, of course, it depends what you are comparing it with, definitely not Nvidia as a singular stock but comparing it with my other holdings, it has performed pretty well.

The volatility of QQQ is much higher as compared to SPY or VOO since the holdings are slightly more tech and has a higher percentage on a select few so if the select few companies drop or increases, QQQ reflects that change more as we can see from the past few days.

QQQ currently takes up about 69% of my stock portfolio, I recently sold AMD at a profit and dumped it all into QQQ as I do not want to manage too many individual stocks. So this is my largest holding at the moment in my stock portfolio and most profitable position. Will definitely be holding this long term.

Tesla

Tesla has been a substantial portion of my portfolio all along. It went from in profit to a loss over the past few years. It is about 28% of my portfolio, dropped substantially because of the drop in prices. Overall, just holding onto this and seeing how it goes, sentiment has been negative due to delivery numbers and high interest rate environment being longer than expected. Short term, not much positive news but long term, if it can deliver on what was on the roadmap, then we do see growth for it. For now, not planning on selling or buying.

Bitwise Bitcoin ETF

I know it sounds ridiculous to hold BTC via a custodian when I can just buy BTC directly but I got into it when it was just released which was a good entry price because BTC shot up afterwards so the position is in profit. Don’t think I will be adding more but it was just a buy some while it was cheap, might sell it soon but it is a super small position since it was also more of a fun position. It is about 1.81% of my stock portfolio.

Things I am looking at and things I am not looking at

I am looking at adding VT to my portfolio in the remaining time of 2024. This is to balance out volatility as you can see from having QQQ and Tesla, the portfolio fluctuates pretty crazily. VT is relatively stable in prices, I had a position in VT from Covid period and I started picking it up when it was around $70 - $80 USD but sold them at around $101 USD to buy other stocks.

At the moment, I am not looking at accumulating any individual stocks but things might change along the way. Will look back on this in a few months or years and see if there are any changes made.

New Updates, writing this on 19 April 2024

Just a few days pass since writing this article and the stock market has took a dive due to the attacks and tension in the Middle East. Things don’t look very positive at the moment and the portfolio has suffered substantially but will be DCA-ing into index funds and see how it goes.

Percentages of the position hasn’t changed much so will keep it as such even though in value, it has decreased. Hoping for the safety of everyone and that the situation does not escalate any further. A lot of other things that are much more important than my portfolio so go out and live your best life!

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Interesting Article I read | My Nvidia Time Bomb (-USD141.5k Unrealised Loss & Counting), Why You Should Never Sell Naked CALL, The Danger Of Short Selling

This is an interesting take from Jason as it was such a personal and yet informative piece and encapsulated the actions and emotions of investing/trading. It is a piece that the author willingly shared with the experience of making a mistake and accepting that loss.

https://learninginvestmentwithjasoncai.com/2024/03/10/my-nvidia-time-bomb-usd141-5k-unrealised-loss-counting-why-you-should-never-sell-naked-call-the-danger-of-short-selling/

It is never easy to share your losses and in the article, Jason shared how he had 300 shares of Nvidia, that is not a small amount judging by the current price. He lost them at a lower price than today due to selling covered calls, he then sold 200 shares trying to cover the loss and sold naked calls as he thought that Nvidia was in for a correction but it went up instead. Since he sold a naked call, he is short of 200 shares of Nvidia to repay as the prices of Nvidia goes higher, he would accumulate more losses.

If you read through his blog, this is definitely not the first time he is facing such a huge loss: https://learninginvestmentwithjasoncai.com/2022/06/20/if-you-are-feeling-depressed-from-losing-lots-of-money-in-the-stock-market-heres-an-article-for-you/

It is a great read as the amount is heart wrenching and serves a valuable lesson and insight to those who are starting out in options trading. I am no guru and just wanted to share this article that I read.

My options journey

I am a newbie in options and I would like it to stay that way, I mostly do covered calls and once in awhile cash secured puts, I like available cash to be invested so I haven’t done much cash secured puts but I think it is a great way to purchase shares that you want at a lower price and at the same time, earn a premium on it.

I just started covered calls in the later part of 2023 so not a long time of experience but I like that it brings in some form of premium, although some times it is not worth especially when earnings call or CPI or FOMC meetings are around the corner as the volatility can make the stock go substantially up. I keep a sufficient margin between the strike price and the current market price so far, I have hit the strike price about twice, mostly last year. But the difference of my purchase price back is not huge as I usually buy like a 20 to 30 days time period.

Overall still learning and believe that managing your emotions is important when experiencing the price going near to your strike price. You suddenly get a shot of adrenaline thinking of ways to reduce the loss and if it shoots higher, what will happen? My portfolio has increased substantially due to the premiums I am earning as I reinvest them back in, keeping it up with the covered calls until it’s too volatile then I might take a break.

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Q1 2024 Portfolio Review | Crypto is back and running!

Here we are recording the financials for Q1 2024, feels like the year just started a few days ago with CNY and in the blink of an eye, we are at the end of Q1 2024. The markets have been crazy with AI and cryptocurrencies leading the pack. My portfolio is not so oriented towards AI however I do hold a small position in Bitcoin and Ethereum, with that, the value of the portfolio has increased substantially. I am a small holder of Bitcoin and Ethereum so I can only imagine how insane for those who hold a large amount of cryptocurrency in their portfolio.

The portfolio performed pretty well in Q1 and I am rather satisfied with how it is, the recovery of crypto especially with the BTC ETFs have helped the portfolio propel to new highs, although going into Q2, prices have dropped slightly.

Stocks Portfolio

Stocks portfolio was rather flat and instead downwards since Tesla hasn’t performed well in Q1 and the numbers released so far is showing that not as much cars was sold as expected. There are also rumors (not confirmed?) that Tesla will not have the model 2 which is the low cost EV. But there is an announcement that there will be a robo-taxi being announced/shown on 8 August 2024 so that will be something to look forward to.

Another position that I had was AMD, my average price was about $110 and I sold it for a profit, moving it over to QQQ. AMD will be coming out with their results but I just wanted to take profit and move it over to QQQ. I was previously doing covered calls with Tesla and AMD but now, will just occasionally do it with Tesla.

I like to build up a position of QQQ before venturing into individuals stocks. Great that my AMD position was in profit, allowed me to take profit, Tesla is still underwater for me and so we shall see how it goes. I usually record the numbers either on the last day of first day or the new month hence explaining why it records till April numbers although Q1 ends on March.

Although Tesla was down, QQQ did well and so here is the value of it:

Cryptocurrencies

Amazing quarter for cryptocurrencies as they were pumped up with BTC ETF and the exposure expanded with memecoins and NFTs making a comeback. And when the interest builds up, it attracts a lot of attention as we see individuals gain unimaginable profits within a short time.

The anticipation of BTC ETF was predicted to be huge as people saw that there would be huge inflows towards the ETFs since individuals who wanted exposure but found it troublesome to create an account in an exchange and having to buy and store it in the exchange or cold wallet.

Imagine being in your 60s and looking at FTX collapse, I don’t think I would trust any other exchanges. But the name Blackrock changes everything since they would manage the BTC ETF so I guess for some, the BTC ETF is a great way for exposure to Bitcoin.

The prices have been steadily increasing with some dips along the way, I am not adding any huge positions but might continue to buy a small amount of ETH as my paycheck comes in monthly. But I guess I will see how it goes after the BTC halving roughly around 20 April.

Syfe REITs

REITs have seen a slight recovery at least in the case of Syfe REITs, it has been dropping and dropping so a slight recovery is good to see although we don’t know when it will recover back to it’s usual prices before the interest rate hike, with the slow DCA I have been doing monthly, just $200 monthly, it has build up to a pretty nice amount, including dividends, I would have some profit but overall still a loss since I did start when interest rates were just being cut.

Not stopping that small amount monthly, I will be putting in until some time and I will have the dividends do it’s job with no addition from me until a certain age then I will activate the payouts.

Going into Q2 2024

The rates cuts are anticipated but no one can really confirm when it will start. We shall see how it goes anyway there will be some rate cuts starting this year, trying to keep some cash on the side but a bad habit of mine is that I like every available cash on hand to be invested as I have this fear of missing out.

Not a very good habit because when the market falls, I find myself not having spare cash to invest (not touching my emergency funds). Also, this causes me not want to sell shares as I am afraid that the moment I sell it, it goes up. I need to be more detached and take profits when there is a need.

Keeping schedule of my monthly contributions and making sure I am staying invested are my 2 priorities at the moment, other than that, learning to work and enjoy life at the same time is also what I am working on. Wishing for a new ATH for Q2 2024.

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It is my birthday month! | Last year of my twenties

We are now into the month of March. Time flies, I wanted this out in the early part of March but it has dragged on for quite awhile. March is quite a special month as it is my birthday month! It is always an exciting month as you meet up with friends and family but for about 1/3 of the month, I will be spending it overseas. It will be the first time I visit this country and first trip of the year so pretty exciting but a lot of preparation works.

Last year of my twenties

I have repeated this multiple times but it’s hasn’t fully registered in my head, it is my LAST YEAR OF TWENTIES! Never really thought about how I would feel entering my thirties soon since I didn’t keep track of my age ever since I was 24 then the pandemic snatched 2 years from me, making it so comfortable staying at home and being alone.

But I still want to make this year fabulous and amazing so not too sure how it will be but going to be doing things that 5 years later/10 years later me would thank the current me for starting.

Having more fun

Taking things more lightly from here and spending more as I think it is maybe time to loosen a little and relax. Planning a few trips this year and hoping to find time to do interesting things. Of course, investing would still be my core but not like super important as I think it is like a milestone, having lived out my twenties so time to spend a portion and enjoy life.

Taking more care of my health and fitness

Having the flexibility to work from home has made me relatively lazier and leading quite a sedentary life, I can feel myself getting lazier and unhealthy. I have signed up for a gym membership and so far has been diligently going in a few times per week. Took a break for a week since I was overseas but hoping to make it a habit and continue.

Financially

I am happy with how my finances are although in Singapore, money is never enough, the inflation these few years have made me realised that growing your money and increasing your income is so important. Nothing is going to stay constant, Singapore is still relatively affordable in terms of daily necessities as compared to the western counterparts but if things continue in it’s current state, it can become really tough to sustain with no income increase and more commitments in the future eg mortgage.

I hope to be able to free up more cash to invest, I have been rather lax recently and burst my spending budgets for some months especially with the end of year festive period and CNY followed by an overseas trip.

Making it all about the present and enjoying the moment as much as I can

I want to live more in the present, stop thinking of what others think of me. Not in a too crazy way but in a be myself way. Taking one day at a time and making it great!

How I budget when I was a fresh grad versus how I budget now as a working adult

 Budgeting is a huge part to managing your finances. Making a suitable budget and sticking to it can make your financial journey easier and accelerate achieving your financial goals.

It might not be easy at first and you might make some slight adjustments but once you have a budget that you can work with, in the long term, the results will be visible. Making a budget as a fresh graduate from university is definitely different after working for 4 years as you would probably see your income grow and inevitably, there might be some lifestyle inflation.

My budget from 4 years ago is definitely different from now and mainly because of income and current expenses. But if we were to see it as percentage terms, there really isn’t any huge change in percentage but definitely changes in absolute number terms. So let me share on how I budgeted.

Budget as a fresh graduate

Graduating and getting a job was nice, I felt like I was ready for the adult world and all ready to carve out my own journey. But when I first started, my starting salary was $2700 gross so after CPF deduction I took about $2160. This was not much to work with especially after giving allowance to my mum and paying the bills. Also, since I just started full-time work, building up an emergency fund was my first priority instead of investing.

A larger proportion went to my savings as a fresh graduate and I also had to find ways to reduce my expenditure to be able to save more. Fortunately, most of your peers would have also just started working so the expenditure of all of you would be roughly the same and so my friends mostly met at affordable options.

Below is a rough graph on how my budget was as a fresh graduate after I have build up my emergency funds of about 4 months:

 

As a fresh graduate, there might be expenses where you are tempted to spend for example an expensive outfit or branded bag or wallet but know what is a need and a want is the most important thing. I also don’t think there is a need to manage and scrutinise every expenditure but don’t go too crazy.

Budget after 4 years of work experience

Over the past 4 years, my salary has seen some increment not huge but big enough for me to be able to put aside more for investing as well as increase my expenses slightly.

I like to go for good meals with my family in the weekends and travel a little more frequently compared to the past. Beside being able to classify these as experiences, I believe it is good to spend some money to let my mum enjoy herself although I don’t pay for her travel expenses but help by giving her an allowance monthly and pay for meals when we eat out.

Budgeting has changed quite a bit but in terms of percentages, it has not deviated much. Here is my current budget allocation, you can see that I am still saving although lesser, I do have my emergency funds build up already and set aside but I am still putting aside money every month, this savings that I am setting aside monthly is for big ticket items like insurance payments, travel expenses and bills. I don’t track my expenses but just ensure that I have sufficient liquid cash savings in my ‘savings’ account which is actually a spending account, the account holding my emergency funds is never touched. Whatever is left in the ‘savings account’ will just be left there or if the amount grows big then it will be re-allocated.

I didn’t hugely increase my allowance to my parents so that is why other areas are seeing an increase for example investments and expenses. Of course, it depends if you would like to increase the budget for your parents and it differs for every individual.

Current Budget:

Plan and work with what fits you best

Everyone is different and the circumstances are not the same so there is no one size fits all budget but instead you need to plan and find what best fits you. Also, in the first few years of working is when you can maximise your savings and investment rate as you have lesser big ticket items.

You will be able to survive on lesser too as you have just graduated from school and shouldn’t have that big of an expenses. Some of us might have study loans to repay and so remember to budget that in as well.

As mentioned in a previous post I did, where I mentioned that your investments are not going to grow linearly so in the early years, building up will seem tough as the compounding is not huge due to the capital amount but keep at it and you will see the difference in the long run.

It is a good first step to managing your finances and having the habit of budgeting makes sure that every dollar is accounted for. As your income grows, your budget might change but you would have had a good habit via your budget allocation hence setting you up for success in achieving your long term goals.

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How my investments in 2024 will go | Plan for 2024, am I still holding onto TSLA?

The first month of 2024 has just passed and already my portfolio is facing some downward pressure. If you are not aware, I do have a substantial percentage of my portfolio in Tesla, with the recent months of adding QQQ, the percentage has gone down but it is still about 30% of my whole portfolio which can have huge impacts considering it’s share price after the recent Q4 2023 results.

The share price has fallen below $200 and we do see some selling pressure as the outlook for 2024 seems rather dull judging by what was said and in the AI innovation portion, Elon Musk was rather negative on the innovation especially when it was related to the Dojo supercomputer as he mentioned that a hedge would be to get Nvidia’s GPUs. So how then am I investing in 2024 and am I letting go of all my Tesla shares?

Hold or let it go

It really goes back to why I invested in Tesla in the first place, I can justify that they still have a lot to achieve and have the potential for huge growth ahead but we can see some obstacles ahead as we do not see the exponential growth that was set originally. Additionally, Elon Musk seems to be facing various pain points in gaining the majority stake in the company which will allow him to do what he wants or think is the best for the company.

Although Tesla is an innovative company but it now has grown to a substantial size and with great power comes great responsibility so it seems tough for Elon to have control over how he hopes to navigate or organise the company. It also seems like Elon has a lot of haters although there are many who also stand by Tesla. I still am holding to my Tesla shares and will be seeing how it goes.

What am I doing while holding

I am adding QQQ as this AI growth has benefited numerous companies and some of the magnificent 7 has seen good growth and opportunities like Meta and Microsoft and of course Nvidia. I am now more into index investing while doing covered calls, so no individual stocks as I have mentioned previously. No plans to trim any of my individual stocks at the moment.

Things are not fixed, action as we go along

With all that being said, all plans are not fixed and it might changes as things happen considering the markets and economy is really volatile. Everyday, we are hearing of layoffs as companies stay lean and slowly incorporate AI into their work streams.

I can also see it in my company as we are a technology company though not part of the big tech but it is still going through some changes as we adapt and accept that AI will be taking over some of the mundane and repetitive work.

The price action for Tesla shares have been in a rout as we do see negative outlook on it as interest rate remains high, comparing Tesla with Nvidia, Microsoft and Amazon, it is rather painful. Some times, I do wish that it has been allocated to maybe Nvidia so the growth recently would have been exponential.

I do see how Tesla can grow in time to come but short term, it looks really tough for it to break out especially since the automobile sector is what it is in focus for now, there are many other energy sectors that Tesla is developing but for now, it seems tough with profit and growth not as predicted and share prices being compressed.

We shall look back again at the end of Q1, Q2, Q3 and 2024 to see how it all goes, in the meantime, QQQ is my building block.

If you are interested in creating any account with the below, it will help me with a little incentives but if you have your own affiliate links/Codes, go ahead and use them instead. Thank you

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