Tag Archives: OCBC

Reading too much into news & Wall Street movement can derail our financial plan

OCBC, Z-FINANCIAL EDUCATION, Z-INVESTMENTS, Z-Personal Finance, Z-STOCK INDICES, , , , ,

Very often we try to check the Wall Street movement and the futures to have an idea of what is likely to happen in the local stock market at the start of the trading day. After all, the Wall Street houses a few largest exchanges in the world. Most of us see this totally out-of-phase time difference as an important leading indicator to position our trades. Big falls are often discussed extensively with a lot of anxiety and anticipation of how low the STI can retreat in response to those falls. Some of us may even be tempted to ‘sell into strength’ at the start of the trading session.

Actually, there were times the STI did not fall in tandem with the Dow Jones or NASDAQ. Just over the last weekend, many were anticipating that the STI would be in for a big fall when the Dow Jones sank 572.46 points from the close of 24,505.22 on their Thursday to 23,932.76 at close on their Friday. But, the STI actually moved up by 7.48 points from the close of 3,442.5 on Friday, 6 April 2018 to 3,449.8.98 at close on Monday, 9 April 2018.

Then on Tuesday, 10 April when President Donald Trump brought out the possibility of aerial strike in Syria, the Dow Jones sank 218.55 points, but the following day, STI advanced 13.38 points. Despite those devastating news, the STI actually advanced close to 100 points (or close to 3%) for the week. For the same period, the Dow Jones also advanced 427.38 points from 23,932.76 to 24,360.14 and the NASDAQ advanced 191.54 points from 6,915.1099 to 7,106.6499. Perhaps, there may be some kind of co-relationship between Wall Street and STI over time, but it does not mean that the STI move in exact lock-step with the Wall Street movement.

Perhaps, those who try to time the sell are not really selling off their stocks for good. It is likely that they wanted to take advantage of the steep fall in the Wall Street to sell and hope to buy them all back when the share prices tank significantly. This could be a wise thing to do if the Wall Street and the STI have perfect correlation on day-to-day basis, but we often find ourselves caught in the situation if our timing is incorrect.

Let us look at transaction cost to assess if the risk is worth taking. Take OCBC for example. Assuming if we were to sell off 1000 shares at the opening bell at $12.77 on Monday, 9 April, and let’s say we were lucky enough to buy back the same stock at the lowest share price of the day at $12.93 on Friday, 13 April, it would still be a loss of about $248 dollars. Even using a priority banking nominee account on Standard Chartered trading platform which is supposedly the lowest brokerage, it still set us back by $220.50. Apart from the trading loss, there is also an end-of-FY dividend distribution of $190 that sellers are likely to miss out given that the ex-dividend date is around the corner. Without considering the loss of dividend, we have to wait till the stock price drop to $12.65 and $12.71 respectively (or a drop of 12 cents and 9 cents respectively) to buy back in order to just break even. With the dividend loss thrown in, the purchase price would have to go lower by a further 19 cents before we can break even. Given that that ex-dividend is drawing near, it is unlikely that the share price retreats significantly for us to cover the transaction cost, trading losses and the loss of dividend. So, the dividend is likely be lost just because of the little folly unless something significantly bad happens from now till the ex-dividend date. Perhaps if investors lost their patience, they may even go ahead to buy back the shares at a higher price. So instead of benefiting in stock investments by simply holding them, we may lose out in terms of the brokerage and all the additional costs in selling and buying them back. Of course, one may argue that the stock price is likely to drop when it goes ex-dividend, but it is still possible that the drop is less than the dividend amount or even creeps up after the ex-dividend. So why leave our fate to chance?

With so many news from many major economies happening every day, it would certainly ruin our financial plans in the long run if we keep reacting to the stock market movements. Sometimes just simply doing nothing is the best strategy of all.

Afternote – Just hours ago, US together with its allies, France and UK, attacked Syria over the alleged use of chemical weapons. Care to make a guess of the STI movement for this coming Monday?

Disclaimer – The above arguments are the personal opinions of the writer. It is not a recommendation to buy or sell the mentioned securities, the indices or any ETFs or unit trusts related to the mentioned indices. 

Brennen has been investing in the stock market for 28 years. He trains occasionally and is a managing partner for BP Wealth Learning Centre. He is the instructor for two online courses on InvestingNote – Value Investing: The Essential Guide and Value Investing: The Ultimate Guide. He is also the author of the book – “Building Wealth Together Through Stocks” which is available in both soft and hardcopy.

DBS – The pleasant surprise

DBS, OCBC, UOB, YZ-BANKS, , , , ,

Abstract – Two years ago, the sudden devaluation of the Chinese yuan RMB caused DBS share price to fall below its book value. Since then, DBS Holdings share price has been on the rise. In a similar fashion, the share price of OCBC and UOB also fell to below their respective book value. For the past two years, the share prices of all the three banks were rising at unprecedented pace. As of 23 Feb 2018, the share prices of DBS, OCBC and UOB were respectively at $29.59, $13.37 and $28.05 respectively.

It came as a big surprise to many that DBS announced a very generous dividend distribution policy following their internal assessment that they have been more than fulfilled the Basel reform requirements. Historically DBS has never been this generous and their dividend distribution to share price ratio has almost always been lagging behind OCBC. Even during times when they offer scrip dividends, their discount has always been lower than that of OCBC. As their share price advanced, the number of scrip dividends that can be converted from the dividends gets smaller, and it became extremely daunting for people who has been targeting to get, for instance, 500 shares for every year of dividend declared. In simple arithmetic, by the time the share price hit about $20, we need to have at least 15,152 DBS shares before one can get 500 shares of scrip dividends assuming that no discount was given for taking scrip dividends. As the share price goes upwards, it is almost an impossible task as the horses are running well ahead of the chariot.

But that all changed overnight as DBS suddenly moved up the dividend generously from the expected final dividend of 33 cents for FY 2017 dividend to 60 cents and topped it up with a special dividend of 50 cents. In addition, it further announced that the dividend going forward to be marked up to $1.20. This means that we should generally expect the dividend pay out to be $1.20 per share for 2018 and, perhaps, even for the next few years. The whole dividend equation changed overnight. What that has been a more and more distant dream of getting 500 shares for each yearly dividend distribution became an instant possibility overnight. For example, in the above case, we do not need 15152 shares for have 500 shares of declared dividend. Instead, we need to have only 8333 DBS shares to get an equivalent of 500 DBS shares in declared dividend. Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, depending on whether one owns the shares or still wanting to buy the shares, the share price never look back. It has been gradually rising two weeks ago from $25.36 on 7 February, the closing price on the day before the results announcement, to $29.59 as of yesterday. This represents a rise of more than $4 or about 16.7% rise within a matter of two weeks, literally unperturbed by the Chinese new year holidays in between. With the newly declared dividend for at least in the near future, it actually helps provide a ‘floor’ share price for the stock.  (For those who wish to have a better idea of the valuation may wish to refer to my on-line course on the investingnote.com platform – Value Investing – The Essential Guide) For example, the share price of $24 would now have been considered a steal when it was said to be ‘extremely expensive’ even at $20/- just twelve months ago.

Apart from the positive effect on its share price, the newly declared dividend distribution by DBS has other pulling effects too. It turned on the pressure for the other two banks to up their dividends going forward as well. In fact, in the latest results announcement for FY2017, both OCBC and UOB have already declared a higher dividend whether in the form of the final or special dividends. As we all know, bank performances tend to move in tandem with each other. So, with the more generous declaration for DBS, it is also likely that the heat for OCBC and UOB be turned on to bring up their dividends as well. Even if that do not happen in the near future, the current perception of a higher dividend declaration would help push up their share prices. Adding to this tail-wind is the expectation of higher net interest margin in the coming months. That means the shareholders of the all the banks would ‘huat’ (prosperous) in the light of this pleasant announcement.

Disclaimer – The above arguments are the personal opinion of the writer. It is not a recommendation to buy or sell the mentioned securities.  

Brennen has been investing in the stock market for 28 years. He trains occasionally and is a managing partner for BP Wealth Learning Centre. He is the instructor for two online courses on InvestingNote – Value Investing: The Essential Guide and Value Investing: The Ultimate Guide. He is also the author of the book – “Building Wealth Together Through Stocks” which is available in both soft and hardcopy.

Yield hungry? We need to change of our investing paradigm

YZ-BANKS, YZ-PROPERTIES, YZ-REIT, , , , , ,

The much anticipated interest rate hike in December had caused a sharp recent drop in the price of REITs recently. Many REITs are now trading at the 2016 low, retreating generally about 7-10% from its peak level at 2016 high and around 15-20% from their all-time high. During the low interest rate environment like in the past few years, many have seen buying into REITs as a no-brainer investment, with yield of between 5% and 8% of passive income, depending on the type of REITs. With the recent falls, many people see them as opportunities. Whether, these REITs are going to be good investments…well, seriously, I do not know. It is too early to tell. There are actually several other factors apart from the REITs price itself to determine if one is buying into a gem. The income of a REIT can fall drastically because state of economy or a change in the customer mindset, resulting in a drastic fall in the DPU going forward. The REIT manager could also take advantage of the generally depressed property price to add more properties into the REIT portfolio or it could be the REIT has some issue with re-financing such that it has to issue rights at depressed price to get existing unit-holders to support the corporate action. All these could happen with swipe of a pen, to get existing unit-holders to fork out more funds instead of the note-holders getting passive incomes out of the REIT.

In fact, by now many bond-holders or note-holders have experienced rude shocks of bond prices falling off the cliff. Several offshore and marine notes are now trading 35-40 cents on a dollar, erasing two-third of the value. Yes, the note holders had enjoyed 6%-7% in the last one or two good years of coupon distribution, but these returns simply are not able to offset the huge fall in the bond price. Many note-holders are now having legal tussles with the note-issuers. These tussles will take months and even years to resolve with no guarantee that note-holders can get their money back.  After all, it is a situation of a willing buyer and a willing seller when the transaction was made. The promise of high return is bundled together with the risk that the issuer could get into a default.

With the local low interest cycle apparently coming to an end, there came a herd of companies trying to tap into pockets retail investors by issuing notes and perpetual bonds with seemingly high coupon rate ranging between 4.5% and 6% in the first half of the year. These companies are highly indebted. The reality came when Swiber Holdings default its coupon payment in July 2016 and all these bond prices are now trading below the IPO issued prices. Even before the first coupon was issued for all these bonds, the yield has already shot up showing that retail investors are probably paying too much in exchange for the risk assumed. In fact, those that missed the over-subscribed IPOs enjoyed a better yield by buying from the open market. However, the crux of the matter is whether any of these companies will default. It is still too early to know. But we do know that these companies are highly indebted and may get into serious financial trouble when the interest rate perks up.   

 

With the spectre of interest hikes coming up soon, investors are now off-loading interest rate–sensitive financial assets in exchange for safer assets such as bank stocks, which are said to benefit when interest rate rises. After all, the bank stocks just one week ago, were trading either below book value or close to book value. But again, this is just a flight to safety. While the banks delivered fairly good results in this quarter, it is not expected that they would perform extremely well going forward given the state of the economy and their exposure to the offshore and marine sector. But still, over a short span of a few days, the banks shot up between 3.5% and 8%. While I am generally happy with this situation due to the components of my portfolio, the interest rate increase may be a double-edged sword for the banks. It’s not the time to be too aggressive.

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Brennen has been investing in the stock market for 26 years. He trains occasionally and is a managing partner for BP Wealth Learning Centre. He is also the author of the book – “Building Wealth Together Through Stocks” which is available in both soft and hardcopy.

DBS- script dividend is out of money

DBS, YZ-BANKS, Z-Personal Finance, , , , , ,

DBS announced the script dividend of $0.60 per share at a conversion of $20.99 per share. This was established during the book clourse around the end April 2015. In the month of May 2015, the share price had been higher than $21 per share for the first half of May 2015, but of late if has slide below $21.00. With the script dividend conversion rate of $20.99, it should be out of money if the shareholders chose to take script dividend and held till today. Given that DBS does not give discount to entice shareholders to take script dividend, I still prefer to take cash, and when the opportunity is right, to use the cash dividend to buy shares from open market at a much lower price. In this way, I would not have odd lots of shares and at the same time enjoys an opportunity to buy DBS shares at a lower price.

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Perhaps, it’s high time that DBS should consider a discount when distributing script dividend and, more importantly, to increase its dividend payout given that dividend has been flattish for a long, long time. With the increasing share price, the dividend yield is dwindling fast. The dividend of $0.60 over a share price of about $21 per share puts the dividend yield below 3%.

(Brennen Pak has been a stock investor for more than 25 years. He is the Principal Trainer of BP Wealth Learning Centre LLP. He is the author of the book “Building Wealth Together Through Stocks.”) – The ebook version may be purchased via www.investingnote.com.

OCBC – script dividend in the money

OCBC, YZ-BANKS, Z-Personal Finance, , , , , , ,

Recently, OCBC announced the distribution of scrip dividend in lieu of cash dividend. Its dividend was $0.18 per share and the bank had established a conversion rate of $9.50 per share, a discount to on-going share price. Given the discount to the prevailing share price, the scrip dividend has been ‘in-the-money’. Those shareholders who opted for script dividend would have gained much more than the original dividend if he had held the stocks till today.  With the current share price of about $10.36, the share holders would have gained $0.86 per share for the dividend that they held in scripts. In fact, script dividend can be a powerful compounding tool if the share price increase gradually over the years.

Slide32

 (Brennen Pak has been a stock investor for more than 25 years. He is the Principal Trainer of BP Wealth Learning Centre LLP. He is the author of the book “Building Wealth Together Through Stocks.”) – The ebook version may be purchased via www.investingnote.com.

Singapore banks – Net interest margins (NIM)

DBS, OCBC, YZ-BANKS, Z-FINANCIAL EDUCATION, Z-INVESTMENTS, , , , ,

Much fanfare has been thrown on banks’ net interest margin (NIM) as the impending interest rates hike seemed to gain traction. As it is, our interest rate lags behind the US interest rates, and it is only a matter of time that our interest rates go upwards as well. As banks are in the business of lending, it is natural that the banks are the likely beneficiaries of interest rate hikes. This leads to an active interest in the bank shares in Q4 2014. The share price of the local bank, namely, DBS, OCBC and UOB were up between 7.4% and 11.8%.

 Slide35

Predictably, in the months that followed, the 3-month SIBOR were increasing. In March 2015, the 3-month SIBOR hit 0.9% and then 1.02% in April 2015. However, as of 29 May 2015, the last trading day of May 2015, the 3-month SIBOR was only at 0.83%. Even though the quarterly financial results of our banks showed significant increase both on y-o-y and q-o-q bases, the NIM were actually quite disappointing for DBS and OCBC. OCBC’s NIM reduced by 5bp on q-o-q and 8bp on y-o-y. DBS’s NIM increased by 3bp y-o-y, but dropped by 2bp q-o-q. This bagged a question whether the interest rate hike is really gaining traction, or it is too early to tell.

Here are the possible outcomes with the interest rate hikes:

a.   The existing borrowers of bank loans such as the business and individual borrowers are subject to higher loan rates, which effectively benefit the banks. It is possible that these borrowers look for alternative sources of funds, but sources are limited as general interest rate environment increases.

b.   New borrowers have less propensity to borrow, as the interest payments become more costly. There may also be some pockets of borrowers who decide cash out their assets or to sell out other assets to pay off their loans, thus causing a net decrease in borrowing. There may even be possible that some cash-rich borrowers decide to reduce their cash holdings to redeem their loans.

c.   The impending interest rate hike may put off borrowings of some ‘marginal borowers’, thus causing the banks’s net borrowing to decrease. This may have resulted in the decrease in the 3-month SIBOR. However, it may be too early to tell at this moment.

d.   The interest hike may result in more non-performance loans (NPL) which negate the benefits of the interest rate hike for the banks.

The valuation of DBS is included in the latest book – “Building Wealth Together Through Stocks”. The methodology can be read across to other banks. 

(Brennen Pak has been a stock investor for more than 25 years. He is the Principal Trainer of BP Wealth Learning Centre LLP. He is the author of the book “Building Wealth Together Through Stocks.”) – The ebook version may be purchased via www.investingnote.com.