An Investor's Opinion.

Lump sum investment vs. DCA investment.


Okay, this is not another round of debate on which strategy is better or more superior. It is a misleading title to gather your attention.

This is a straight forward reminder to newbies who got lost in their interpretation of things, especially those who did not think through what they read in forums. Those who thought they can hit the ground running as they thought they had the basics correct.
More often than not, when they read about lump sum investment, they thought of its merits and whether it will give better returns than a DCA investment.

And inevitably the discussions, as they often do when a half-blind is leading a blind person, will go astray into scenarios where lump sum is better, and scenarios where DCA will beat lump sum in returns.

This comes about because they thought of lump sum investment as a large sum of money to invest – and it leads directly to deciding whether to invest the large sum of money at once, or split it into several months or longer.

What they had failed to realise is that the one important characteristic that defines the investment as a lump sum investment is this – it is a one sum of money available. It is ONE amount of money available, and no more.

A most likely scenario of lump sum investment to happen is when you are at retirement age, and thinking of what to do with the large amount of money available to be withdrawn from EPF.

Another likely scenario would be someone in his mid-forties or so with a sum of money to invest, and who had clearly decided in advance that it is the only amount money he will use and there will be no further money to pour into the investment to achieve his objective – which is usually a short term objective.

For any youngster who was just joining the rat race, it will be a ridiculous talk kok session for them to begin a discussion on lump sum investment into any UT fund. Whatever sum of money they have in hand, it is insignificant to their future earnings.

For them, IMHO, it would be more constructive to discuss UT investments as part of money management. How much to invest out of their monthly savings. How much to have in an emergency fund, in cases of being retrenched or getting the sack.

And more importantly, whether the emergency fund should includes any money to continue on with the regular monthly investments.

Cheers.

Hi,

You were replying to a 2 weeks-old post, and which have been addressed by others.

Please try not bump up this thread if there is nothing of substance or constructive to add into the discussion.

Thanks.

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PS. BTW, the post had offended someone sensitive to the tone of your writing, and had been reported. As I started this thread, I can see which post is highlighted as being 'reported'.

I don't have the previlege to edit or delete your post, which I will let it stays as it is even if I have the previlege...

Please, just read and ignore... as this post needs no further reply.

Move on to another discussion, if there is any other things, of substance, to share or just to present your viewpoint on UT investments.

Your situation is relatively easy to sort out, as you have ASB1 and ASB2, and already max them with loans. I am also assuming that you are not touching any of their annual dividends and repaying the loans out of your monthly salary. If it is otherwise, then there is hardly any "cash" to speak of to invest into mutual funds.

It is a matter of fact that EPF is giving good annual returns, abeit lower than ASB. Most of the mutual funds that are approved and allowed by EPF are mostly local funds, and they are about on par if not lower than EPF's returns.

(It is only recently that EPF has decided to allow funds to invest into foreign markets... and I yet to notice any new funds launched catering to this policy change.)

In short, there is hardly any difference in returns to be gained by withdrawing out of EPF, unless the fund is an agressive growth fund. And needless to say, it would be a volatile fund that will mirrors the ups and downs of its benchmark.

So the question is: do you have the stomach to ride it up and down? Some think they can, but pull out when the fund hit negative territory, and incurring a permanent lost.

So, I think we can safely suggest:

1. Use cash rather than money out of EPF. Put aside the EPF money, and ASB, for longer term retirement plans.

2. Since the bulk of your asset is in stable and conservative EPF and ASB funds, it may be desirable to look into more aggresive funds that could grow 10% or more annually.

3. There is an upfront service charge on buying mutual funds. Online platforms give considerable lower charges, from 0% to 2%, while it would be up to 5.5% with agents.

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"Is my plan is OK - (if use cash, I have 20k (and my plan is 2k initial, monthly DCA 300 for 5yrs) which I am OK to lose and at the same I will learn about mutual fund."

The plan is good, but the attitude is bad! It is never never okay to throw money away.

Wouldn't it a better option to do some reading and learn all you can and get as much info as you can, and know what to do before delving into any projects that could cause you injuries?

This post has been edited by j.passing.by: Feb 21 2017, 04:51 PM

Go big or go home.

Every so often, I would looked into other funds, and one of the webpage I often glanced at is this list of top performers in eUnittrust, which also list the worst performers too. https://www.eunittrust.com.my/fundInfo/5top_worst_funds.asp

The top funds can gain up to 5% or more in a mattter of a week. which is 5 business days... among the more agressive funds in Public Mutual would be Public China Select and Public Indonesia Select Fund, where they could at best gain up to 2% in a week,

Taking a look into this list of top (& worst) performers tonight, 2 balanced funds in the 10-years period caught my attention, and both funds belong to the same company.

I think it must be a mistake somewhere since the disparity between them is too wide. Or maybe it is not a typo, but by design in their investment policy.

Kenanga Balanced Fund + 242.22%
Kenanga Shariah Balanced Fund - 13.45%

The 1st fund is almost like a growth or small-cap fund. A 242% growth in 10 years is annualised to 13%.

Which reminded me of the phrase: go big or go home.

1. Transfer is moving your fund to another person.

2. Switching is selling a fund (all of it or part of it) and at the same time, buys another fund. We call it switching from one fund to another as we don't normally pay a further service charge on the new fund, but instead a switching fee.

Things are looking bright this year, most of the equity funds are giving good YTD returns so far... and as usual when things are going well, a new fund is being launched by Public Mutual.

Capitalise on Public e-Flexi Allocation Fund for higher potential growth:

- Only RM100 to start the investment.
- Up to 98% in equity or fixed income securities.
- Up to 30% in foreign markets.
- Up to 3.75% sales charge.
- Initial Issue Price: RM0.25 per unit during Offer Period (14 July to 3 August 2017).
- Invest via Public Mutual Online

Comments:
- This is a active allocation fund which can swings from totally from equity to fixed income securities... the other permanent 2% of the fund is in liquid assets.

- This is the only fund in Public Mutual that has redemption charges. If it is redeem within 2 years, there is a 2% charge.

- It is mainly a local fund investing into the local Bursa, and it is allowed to invest up to 30% into foreign equities.

- As stated above (in blue), it has a lower sales charge than usual as it is via its online service.

=================

Far East and China funds were going great last week, and they are still maintaining their tempo this week. Most of you UT investors would be having portfolios at all time high.

PB Asia Emerging Growth Fund yesterday's daily increase was 2.40%, which is quite unbelievable and it could maybe a typo or a mistake! Let's see whether the price will be re-adjusted tomorrow...

Cheers.

Generally, investing into UT is a long term objective, like for retirement.

With this long term objective in mind, one would usually goes for more aggressive funds which have potential of giving higher growth performance and returns, and would not mind the higher volatility in the short term that comes with the more aggressive funds.

The more aggressive funds like those mid-size and small-cap funds, and most foreign funds as in those China, Far-East and Asia Pacific funds are non-EPF approved funds. The EPF approved funds in Public Mutual are mostly invested in the local stock market – or more precisely, most of the funds in the list of EPF approved funds are in the local Bursa.

BUT lately, this list has expanded to include more foreign funds.

Among them, which would be in my personal short list to consider, are:

PB Asia Pacific Enterprises Fund
PB China Australia Equity Fund
PB Singapore Advantage-30 Equity Fun
Public Asia Ittikal Fund
Public Australia Equity Fund
Public China Ittikal Fund
Public Far-East Telco & Infrastructure Fund
Public Global Select Fund
Public Islamic Asia Leaders Equity Fund
Public Singapore Equity Fund
Public South-East Asia Select Fund

Here is what you can do to check out the full list of EPF-approved funds:
a) See the list of fund prices in Public Mutual, and select the “EPF investment” in the fund group selection. http://www.publicmutual.com.my/application.../fundprice.aspx
b) Go to the EPF site and see the full list of all funds offered by all fund companies. http://www.kwsp.gov.my/portal/en/web/kwsp/...vestment-scheme

As always, being a smart consumer, you should shop around and check out which funds would give the best possible returns, the background of the product, the company offering the product, and the upfront fees such as the sales or service charges and redemption fees, if any.

And also note that the service charge for cash investment (that is money out of your wallet) and EPF investment (that is money out of your EPF account 1) can be different.

Cheers.

Yes, switching has no effect on the total number of points.

You loose points in a redemption (re-purchase) in the equivalent amount, RM1 = 1 point. And only when there are points in that fund's account.

Say, you switch out RM6000 from Fund A, which have RM8,000 and 5,000 points, to Fund B. Fund A will then be RM2,000 and 0 points, and Fund B is now RM6000 and 5,000 points.

If you later fully redeem Fund A, the points are still in Fund B.

This post has been edited by j.passing.by: Aug 6 2017, 04:56 PM

Do you have the money?

This week, the Dow Jones index broke 22,000. And most of the unit trust funds available to us are giving fantastic YTD (year-to-date) performance. Some, were hitting 7 months consecutive positive returns, reaching as high as 20% and above. Even the lowest funds gain about 8%.

An as usual when the market is hot, there is a lot of newcomers wanting to jump in too.

Before any newcomers do that, I hope they do some reading and know what they are getting into. Here are some tips…

First, ask you yourself this: Do you have the money?

The ‘money’ I am referring here would mean money from your regular income; that is savings from your salary.

If you are student and non-working adult, I hope you think twice as there may be some immediate needs of your extra money that is not foreseeable in the near term. Investments into UT are usually for the longer term of not less than 5 years, preferable 2-3 decades and longer. Because the simple reason is that an UT fund is a widely diversified pool of equities and it is easier to get positive returns in the longer term, and it is based on the simple premise that the global economy (and human life itself, knowledge and tech) will not stop growing.

If you are working and don’t have extra money (that is savings or balance from your monthly salary), I hope you think twice too. You too will need to cater for some unforeseeable expenses, and will need it more than the above student/non-working adult.

Whether it is your income or your spending expenditure that you need to look into and improved upon, the chances of an unexpected expenditure is high. It would not be wise to make any investment today, and then having to pull out next week or next month due to being short of money to cover the sudden expenditure.

There were some queries on EPF withdrawal to invest into UT funds. Personally, I would not advocate it. (I don’t advocate PRS either, maybe more on this opinion in another post.)

Simple reason: personal money management. Do you have the money or not? Are you rich enough or not to have extra money put aside every month without fail? If not, why you need to withdraw out of EPF? After all, being able to withdraw out of EPF means that you are earning above average and have more than what is on the ‘basic savings table’ in your age group.

So you are making a good salary, and yet not able to save enough?

Another thing is that EPF is actually a unit trust fund too. And it has a clean record since it was first set-up in 1951. I would only advocate withdrawing from EPF to invest into UT funds if you already have a portfolio of UT funds for years, and the portfolio is giving better returns.

However good the UT fund returns maybe, the actual gain you can get is the difference between it and EPF. While it is the full returns you will get if you invest into the UT fund out of your own money.

Having said that and if you do have and holding some EPF approved funds, please review whether you should put it back into EPF or switch to more aggressive/riskier funds. No risk, no reward. No guts, no glories. If the fund is not aggressive enough and not possible to give a higher return, then might as well put it back into EPF.

The next question to ask is when to begin. This is easy. Start when you have the money.

Don’t wait or delay it too long. With the savings or extra money out of your monthly salary, set aside a portion of it into UT. And some extra into a bank account for immediate or shorter term annual expenses.

Don’t be too worry about ‘building a portfolio of funds’ or whatever it really means. With money in the bank and money in EPF, and money in UT, it is already a “portfolio”.

So, be more concern of putting and adding money regularly (monthly if possible) into one or two good UT funds that you have selected.

At this stage of adding and growing more and more money into that 1 or 2 funds:
a) You are doing DCA (dollar cost average) investment; and should not be too concern about “diversification” or whatever it really means, as DCA is in itself a diversification – buying at many, many different times.

b) You should be in equity fund(s), and not ‘waste’ the extra money in bond or money-market funds. Remember, you already have money in EPF and bank account.

c) Do a review when you reach the next stage; usually when you’re about mid-forties or so, and having reached at least 50% of the pool of money you have set out to achieved; which should be about one million or so if the objective is for retirement income.

All the best of luck to your future endeavour, and thank you for reading.

Cheers.

Yes, you can. But it you are at the branch office, might as well do also the PMO registrationl; unless of course you are dumping PM for good...


AFAIK, the income is already taxed at source; and so far, I have not bothered to include them into my income tax, since the distributions are 'reinvested' and I don't touch or received any income from the funds. Futhermore, I supposed the tax declaration is for those who had actually received the distributions and are seeking a tax rebate on the difference between the 'taxed at souce' and personal incotme-tax.

Or maybe I am mistaken, and the tax man will be knocking on my door soon.

The main benefit of having a jointholder account that I knew of is that the secondary holder will take over the account after the demise of the primary 1st account holder. I'm not too sure a nominee can take over the account or not and continue on having the account, as all the info I got points to the nominee getting the monies with ease.

For more info, see this link http://www.publicmutual.com.my/LinkClick.a...e78%3D&tabid=69 on Trust Nomination. It explains the differences between trust nomination and a will.

The other benefit of being a jointholder is the free PA insurance if you are a gold or elite member. Say the 1st holder met accident and suceesfully claimed, and the 2nd holder took over the account upon demise of 1st holder, the free PA insurance continue to cover the 2nd holder.

For more info on the free PA coverage, see this link http://www.publicmutual.com.my/LinkClick.a...8v0%3D&tabid=69

So I guess it is best to have both. Thank you for this question, as my thoughts were only on the 'transfer' option all this while.

Cheers.

I have to correct my previous opinion on registering into PMO. It is better to have PMO even if there is an intention to fully withdraw and get out of Public Mutual funds.

With PMO, you can:
1) Change the banking details, such that the money can be transfer directly to your bank account - which may be at another bank apart from Public Bank.

2) PMO is reliable and safe. All the transactions are based on TAC codes send to your mobile phone.

3) All the necessary details are present with you online, and you save the hassle of filling them again if you are doing any buy/sell transaction over the counter, be it at the PM branch office or at a Public bank.

4) If you want to sell any funds, and want to pick the best date to do it, obviously the best option is doing it online.

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Please don't be too concern with 'bad' PM consultants. They are not financial advisors who can truly advise you on how best to manage your money.

The best service any UTC can provide to their clients is doing a profile of the investor based on a set of questionnaire to pegionhole the investor as a conservative, moderately aggressive or aggressive investor. And then supply him/her the appropriate funds to select.

Almost all other transaction services that an UTC can provide, it can be done online via PMO.

I know... and heard of claims that there are "good'' UTCs who help to 'manage' their clients' funds and/or give "advices" to their clients.

Before anyone of you readers here believe these claims are true or not, please read up and understand the duty and services that an UTC can and cannot provide.

And most of all, please do not expect too much out of the upfront service charge that are incurred in buying each unit trust fund.

Please la don't have the attitude that your one cent coin is as big as the wheel of a bullock's cart, and expect the UTC to be your own personal financial manager at your beck and call, just because he/she pocketed the commission you paid.



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If you have a public bank ATM card and are using the public bank ATM method to register, first make sure that the bank has your current phone number. When you are at the bank, ask some personnel to verify the number and update it if necessary.

(There is no flaw in the process, I have done it before. I got the TAC code immediately after I had updated them (the bank) of my current phone number. My bank account was opened ages ago... and having several bank accounts, already forgotten which bank account I have or have not update my address/phone number. )

If you are at a Public Mutual office, you can immediately get the username/password handed over to you in a sealed envelope.

Hope above helps.

Back to Basics.

Fund Holidays.

If you are micro managing your funds, ie. monitroing the market indices and choosing the right day to switch funds, you may want to know the funds' holidays too. Otherwise you may be caought by surprise that the stock market relevant to the fund is off for holiday.

For example, most of the Asia Pacific funds are down last week, and it is the right opportunity for you to switch into or top-up a particular fund this week. You may want to see first how is the relevant stock market, say the Hang Seng index, is doing today before you decide to top up or not. (This is an example of micro managing; whether it is worthwhile to micro manage UT funds - is another story for another day.)

And if you happen to know that this week is a short trading week with only 2 days open to business for most of the Asia Pacific funds, you may also find it favourable to have done some transactions last week instead of delaying it to this week.

So aside from monitoring the market indices, knowing the funds and markets holidays is equally important if you want to micro manage your portfolio on a daily basis.

Where to get the info on holidays.

a) Use google. Check out the relevant market index holidays, and book mark it for quick reference.

b) Check the fund company's website. The fund's holidays or non-pricing days maybe published there.

For Public Mutual funds, you may refer to this link: http://www.publicmutual.com.my/LinkClick.a...kY%3d&tabid=440 It is on the fund prices page, within the "Business Day" subsection.

Relevant Market Index.

If you check out the fund's holidays or non-business days, you may also get to know which market is relevant to the fund. For example, the China or Greater China funds are mainly invested in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. While Far-east and Asia Pacific funds would includes South Korea.

Also that the fund's investment into Chinese equites are usually those Chinese stocks that are listed in the Hong Kong stock exchange, not the Shanghai stock exchange.

From the above link, it is noted that this week, there are 3 non-business for most of the Asia Pacific funds.

Monday 2nd Oct: Hong Kong (The day following National Day of China.)
Wednesday 4th Oct: Taiwan & Korea (Mid-Autumn Festival & Korean Thanksgiving Day.)
Thursday, 5th Oct: Hong Kong & Korea (The day following the Chinese Mid-Autumn festiival & Korean Thanksgiving Day)

Also, next week:
Monday, 9th Oct: Taiwan (Adjusted Holiday).

As for the China or Greater China funds, they have the same holidays as above, plus next Tuesday.
Tuesday, 10th Oct: Taiwan (National Day).

The fund's holidays indirectly shows which markets it is heavily invested into, and which stock exchange and stock index is more relevant to it.

Cheers.

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Correction on a copy & paste error: Hong Kong is off today, 5th Oct.

==========

HSI gained +0.73% yesterday. HSCEI (Hang Seng China Enterprises Index) gained +0.81%. Positive gains in Taiwan today.

If they are still in the green tomorrow, these China and Asia Pasific funds could be having their best week of the year.


This post has been edited by j.passing.by: Oct 5 2017, 03:26 PM

Investments into UT funds are usually for the long term. Most would find it not worthwhile in the shorter term as it is a roll of the dice to get the timing right to enter and exit. More so when the invested money is out of EPF.

The money out of EPF has an opportunity cost to it. You are forgoing its stable returns which have hardly any investment risk.

If you think the related markets are at their peak and would like to take some of the funds off the table, then it would be better to switch instead of selling.

In switching, it might cost you a switching fee. (Which is RM25 in Public Mutual.) While there is no exit fee, if you choose to re-enter again, it will cost you another round of service charges. (Which is 3% plus GST in Public Mutual.)

The only instance when there is no difference btw switching or selling is when there is no switching fee and zero service charge.

If you can't think of any better equity fund to switch into, then switch into either a bond fund or a money-market fund.

I would prefer a money-market fund; as there is no switching fee if I have held the equity fund for more than 90 days. Hence it would only cost me a one-time fee when I switch out of the money-market fund later back to the same or another equity fund.

With a bond fund, the switching fee will be incurred twice.

Since the aim of "switching" some money out of EPF - which is also an unit trust fund itself - is for higher returns than what you can get in EPF, having the money in bond and money-market funds for too long will defeat this objective of getting higher returns and it will be an opportunity cost instead.

So don't park the money in the bond or money-market funds too long.

This post has been edited by j.passing.by: Oct 5 2017, 04:11 PM

I'm not too sure, but I don't see any reason that a foreinger could not buy any mutual funds here since Malaysia has no capital gains tax.

You're welcome. You may want to read some of the previous posts which have indirectly addressed this issue of whether to sell or hold, namely the 3 stages of investing into UT funds.

In the 1st stage of accumulating UT funds on a regular basis, it would be easier to hold and invest more and more, bit by bit, and grow your portfolio; rather than time the market.

At this initial stage, where the funds should be the more agressive equity funds - not bond or money-market funds, it will be more difficult to sell or switch out, as we will have to buy back or switch back in to get back to our original plan to have equity funds. Plus we will have to buy more in one shot since we have had also hold back the regular purchases.

EPF has the clout to have this maximum 3% service charge that the fund companies can charge on its members. The normal consumer don't have the backing of any Consumer Watchdog to help lower the usual 5.5% charge.

How much the fund companies want to charge its clients, it is up to them but within the max limit. If not mistaken, FSM charges lesser in both cases.

EPF also has the clout to impose that any money out of its Account 1 is directly under the account holder's name.

[Actually EPF is a joint-holder, if the fund is sold, the money will go back to Account 1.

EPF will release the fund to be under your direct control upon your 55th birthday. The fund's EPF status will be deleted. You can switch it to any non-EPF-approved funds; or if you sell it, the money will go to your bank account.]

Aside from lower charges, an investment platform like FSM is good in that it represents various fund companies; you get to choose and select the better funds of each company. To get this lower charges, you will be using the platform's account. Sort of like asking a friend to buy things under his/her name to get staff discount.

Don't worry... you will get your own individual 'nominee' account to keep track of your investments.

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Tip: If you are browsing this thread under the desktop version, click "Show posts by this member only" to filter the posts.

You may have been misinformed... since I don't encountered such thing. Not logical to build a system that lock out some functions available to the user, and without any information given in its guide on "how to register" .

Recently, PMO has another new service, where the "view only" service is added.

Maybe someone registered the view-only service and then later change to the full service where all the transactions like switching from one fund to another, purchasing and repurchasing can be performed.

If you have easy access to a Public Mutual branch office, then it is easy.
Otherwise, use their Online service to withdraw or sell back to Public Mutual.

(Withdraw or sell back is called "repurchase".)

It usually takes about 3 working days... for the money to go directly into your bank account or to received a cheque.


I doubt there is any mistake, otherwise you would be complaining to them instead of ranting here.

1. A gold member has 18 free switches per calendar year. Or rather RM25 is discounted each time.

There is a minimal switching fee of RM50 within the 90 days holding period. Or a 0.75% charge on the total switch out amount, which ever is higher.

If above the 90 days holding period, the charge is a fixed RM25.

So, whether there is zero switching fee or not, depends on the above rules.

2. The fund that was switched out from could be a low-load fund. A low-load fund is a bond fund that is paid a much lower service charge of 1%. There is no service charge on money-market funds and e-deposit funds.

If you switch from these funds to an equity fund which has a service charge of 5.25% (using the PMO service*), then you will be charge the difference in the service charges.

It will recognised as a "purchase", and not a "switch", as you will not incur any switching fee. Only the difference in the service charges.

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* Purchasing via PMO gets a 0.25% discount. Wahhhh, so generous nehhhh.

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Edit: finally getting the "quotes' right...



This post has been edited by j.passing.by: Oct 13 2017, 07:19 PM

That's very generous already from a known kiam-siap company.

Elite gold also nothing much special. 30 free switches instead of 18.

Okay, gold members also get special invitation to talks/seminar. There's one early next month at Sunway resort. Have never attended any before, and not going to.

Looking at the posted nav prices today on the main Public Mutual webpage, PIOf, has the highest daily increment.

PUBLIC ISLAMIC OPPORTUNITIES FUND 0.72%

I have been holding this small-cap fund since 2014, all of them in several switches just before it closed in late Sept and it was near its annual peak then. And was gradually making the switches on its uptrend to the peak before it closed.

Its performance then went yo-yo, up and down; so there some high periods and some negative periods. Over the course of the next 3 years, in 2016, the returns were pretty flat giving very low effective returns of less than what you can get from FD.

But I hold on... maybe because of the fact that it is closed, if I switched out, I cannot get it back.

Starting this year, its performance started to climb... and climb... and climb. Turning from the worst performing fund in 2016, to be the best local fund of the year (so far this year).

At the moment, the IRR of the switches is 8.5%, with ROI of each switch ranging from 28% to 37%.

Should I take profit and switch out?

No. It has become one of my core funds. I have faith in it, that it will continue its ups and downs over the next several years, but it will eventually be among the better funds that I have invested in.

Maybe it will be reduced (from its current size of about 10% of the entire portfolio) when the portfolio is eventually restructure in its 3rd and final stage when I need to withdraw or cash-out the distributions for retirement income.

Cheers.

============

Today, when I update my portfolio's prices, PIOF +0.72% while the other funds in Greater China and Asia Pacific has sharp falls of about 1%. Overall, in the red... but still up for the month - way, way up from last month.

Today's closing:
KLCI -0.19%
Emas -0.11%
Small Cap +0.31%

HSI +1.17%
HSCEI +1.77%

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Most of the small cap funds are closed. The best alternative, currently - for local funds, would be those small-and-mid-cap funds:
Public Emerging Opportunities Fund
Public Islamic Ermerging Opportunities Fund

If you have browsed through this thread, the recent posts and especially in the post titled "Do you have the money?", what you seek has been discussed and would be relevant to your query.

In short, move the local fund (Ittikal Sequel fund) to a foreign fund such as Islamic Asia Leqders Equity fund.

Lastly, invest in a regular basis instead of doing it in a one-sum fashion. You can withdraw from EPF once every 3 months.

Cheers.

============

PS. The post dated 31st July 2017 is specific to EPF-approved funds.


============

BTW Some of the funds has Personnal Insurance coverage when it is above 10k... Ittikal Sequel is one of them. If getting a free PA is one of the reasons behind its purchase, then keep this in mind before swithing out to another fund.

This post has been edited by j.passing.by: Oct 31 2017, 04:13 PM

Yes, he did spread out the purchases - I missed this... and had spread it over the low period of the past 2 years... if he did a lump sum, the IRR would be lower.

BTW I withdrew from EPF to boost up my gold points to get more chances in the lucky draw... no luck so far. Have restructured the EPF port to 100% in Asia Pacific funds... YTD 10.03% CAGR 12.2% IRR17.5%.

The IRR is on the current restructured port of funds- that's why so high. It is not the IRR since day 1.

Was getting low returns in the initial years too... now slowly catching up. Hopefully that I will be able to amortise the service charge, and beat EPF rates in another couple of years.

Cheers.

This post has been edited by j.passing.by: Oct 31 2017, 04:46 PM

Back to Basics

Was recently looking into these funds, and below are some of the info that was gathered.

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5 mixed asset allocated and balanced funds:

1. Public Tactical Allocation Fund
2. Public Islamic Asia Tactical Allocation Fund
3. PB Dynamic Allocation Fund
4. Public Far-East Balanced Fund
5. Public Navigator Growth Fund

These mixed asset funds can vary their equity holdings.

The permissible range the fund can hold is 30% to 98% in the first 3 funds, 40% to 60% in the 4th fund, and in the last fund, 2% to 98%.

Date Launched (respectively):
23/01/2007, 21/08/2007, 19/05/2012, 23/01/2007, & 03/01/2017.

Current Fund Size, RM million, as at 31 Oct 2017, respectively:
279.41, 166.91, 149.50, 167.71, & 385.14

Performance % (Annualised), respectively::
1-year: 29.22%, 23.62%, 29.74%, 18.52%,
3-year 17.08%, 13.45%, 12.21%, 10.10%
5-year: 14.14% 11.12%, 10.33%, 8.02%.

(The 5th fund was just launched this year.)

Asset Allocation as at 31-10-2017:
Equities & Related Securities – Domestic: 2.75%, 6.25%, 1.03%, 1.33%, 0%.

Equities & Related Securities – Foreign: 85.78%, 78.39%, 90.82%, 56.59%, 69.45%.

Money Market Instruments & Others: 11.47%, 15.36%, 8.15%, 11.83%, 30.55%.

Fixed Income Securities: 0%, 0%, 0%, 30.25%, 0%.

Asset allocation in Top 5 Foreign Countries, as at 31 Oct 2017:

PTAF: China 32.07%, Taiwan 16.91%, USA 14.10%, Korea 11.80%, Thailand 4.31%.

PIATAF: China 26.83%, Taiwan 25.96%, Korea 16.45%, Hong Kong 5.01%.

PBDYNAF: China 34.30%, Taiwan 18.12%, USA 9.19%, Korea 13.92%, Hong Kong 6.90%.

PFEBF: China 24.39%, Singapore 12.27%, Korea 9.84%, Hong Kong 5.67%, Thailand 1.78%.

PNVGF: China 29.64%, Taiwan 14.21%, USA 10.98%, Korea 6.06%, Hong Kong 5.06%.

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Comments/Remarks:

PFEBF is the sole and truly balanced fund, with assets in fixed income securities.

PNVGF, though recently launched this year, proves to be popular with the highest NAV asset of RM385 million. Its benchmark is pretty straight-forward, it is a straight-line 8% growth.

Flexible mixed asset funds can be considered for selection when there is volatility in the markets, and when the investor is unsure how the market outlook will be in the near future, and unsure where and how to allocated his funds.

Cheers.

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PS. The info was taken from the montly reviews, dated 31-Oct-2017 published within PMO.

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Edit: typo corrected in one of the figures.

PPS. Had selected and swithced into 2 of them. Will be switching into another 2, maybe in January or February. The one fund not selected is the balanced fund. Preferred to have a permisable wider range that the fund manager is allowed to work with.



This post has been edited by j.passing.by: Nov 16 2017, 09:54 PM