Hi guys. I see that fsm Singapore has a fee structure that uses an overall platform fee minus the sales charge. Similar to their current fee structure for the bond funds on the fsm Malaysia platform currently. My fear is that eventually the Malaysian platform may adopt a similar fee structure too, considering the bond fund changed from upfront sales charge to platform fee couple years back. This is concerning especially in my case since I plan to invest for the long term (at least 30 years ++). Based on the math an overall platform fee will have major impact on performance compared to one that has an upfront sales charge only (even if it is 5.5%). This is so for investments that exceed 20 years. In my case I would be accumulating for 25 years before having to withdraw funds. Does anyone else feel the same? Would it be better to just DCA into normal upfront sales charge funds. Of course at present there are no platform fees for equity/balanced funds (phew). Just a concern. I guess I’m being quite paranoid about something that has not even happened yet.

@ky33li, That’s true. That would be ideal. Still waiting for an affordable broker that’s regulated here.

@yklooi, eunittrust huh 🤔, I shall look into that, thanks. Yeah I’m currently DCA-ing my way into some core funds in fsm. Inaction certainly is much worse, agreed.

Right I see. That is a pretty enlightening perspective on the matter. Glad to hear that there are more players like eunittrust joining the market. Indeed as you say, hopefully this leads to more competitive fees for us investors.

Hi all. Hoping to get your thoughts and opinions.

How many funds should one have ideally?

In my case I already have about 9k in 3 funds weighted more or less at my target allocation. That is; 45% Affin Select APAC ex Jap Dividend Fund, 45% Affin Select Asia ex Jap Quantum Fund, 10% Affin Select Bond Fund.

The prob however is that I only have RM100 a month to use for DCA-ing. So I have to choose one fund to contribute to each month. Typically I choose the one that is most underweight from the target allocation however my more volatile funds don’t seem to benefit much from the DCA-ing this way.

Are 3 funds too many in my case? I used to only have 2, just the dividend fund and the bond fund. However I’m trying to increase my average annual rate so I added the quantum fund early this year.

Any thoughts? Sorry if it’s a noob question though. I am a noob after all.

Hi all. Hoping to get your thoughts and opinions.

How many funds should one have ideally?

In my case I already have about 9k in 3 funds weighted more or less at my target allocation. That is; 45% Affin Select APAC ex Jap Dividend Fund, 45% Affin Select Asia ex Jap Quantum Fund, 10% Affin Select Bond Fund.

The prob however is that I only have RM100 a month to use for DCA-ing. So I have to choose one fund to contribute to each month. Typically I choose the one that is most underweight from the target allocation however my more volatile funds don’t seem to benefit much from the DCA-ing this way.

Are 3 funds too many in my case? I used to only have 2, just the dividend fund and the bond fund. However I’m trying to increase my average annual rate so I added the quantum fund early this year.

Any thoughts? Sorry if it’s a noob question though. I am a noob after all.

Yes that’s true my allocation lacks geographical diversification in that sense. There is quite little exposure to developed markets (us/euro/aus), 20% more or less.

I have been considering the replacement of one of the funds with something like principal global titans while maintaining quantum or the dividend fund. I do think it was easier to dca when I only had 2 funds. I recently added the quantum earlier this year. Thinking it through and seeking out advice from others too, don’t want to be too hasty.

Thanks for the analysis. Yes I noted that I’m heavy on the China & greater China markets. Like I mentioned above I do consider changing the fund mix, just wondering how often should someone change their funds, also, should it be done gradually or lump sum.

Yes regarding the 10% bonds, the idea was to have some less correlated asset in the mix to act as an indicator for me to know when markets are high/low. Also I would use that fund to lock-in profits and redeploy them when there are good opportunities. Well that’s the strategy at least.

Essentially for the 100/month DCA it’s still not too bad among 3 funds right? I did consider just dumping in all into the aggressive managed portfolio and DCA. However based on my investment goal and time frame I would need at least 12% pa to achieve a mediocre retirement at least since my monthly investments are too small for now. Hoping to increase my income and invest more over time but as of now I’m planning more pessimistically incase my income doesn’t increase the way I hope it does.

Hoping to get at least 1.25 mil (epf+ own investments) when I’m 55, just in case I’m not able to work by that age due to health complications. My mum was like that too, she had a stroke by 59, I think my grandfather had it younger. I have about 20k in investments currently; 9k in UT, 4k in SA, and 7k in KLSE bluechip dividend stocks. So monthly I add 100 UT, 50 SA and 50 stocks.

Well that’s the gist of it at least. Hahaha sorry for the essay guys.

Thanks for the input. Yes hopefully with the overly modest projection, it would mean that my base target would be more realistic and attainable.

True I have been reconsidering my portfolio’s components. I may add the Principal Global Titans fund or the TA Global Tech fund into the mix. Then I will slowly move over the funds away from the dividend and bond fund accordingly. 👍

Hi guys. Just curious as to how most others are going about with their FSM UT investments. Will be glad if anyone is willing to share their strategy/allocation/etc.

In my case I’m going with a 90/10 stock to bond allocation for now. My bonds are local, as for my equities it’s mainly split between developed markets and APAC, although it is more heavy on APAC for now.

My funds are as follows:
Amanahraya Unit Trust Fund 10%
Affin Hwang Select APAC Div Fund 30%
Principal APAC Dynamic Growth Fund 25%
Principal Global Titans 35%

I mainly rebalance monthly using new funds (just by adding to whichever has fallen most from the ideal allocation). If there’s some significant change to the allocation due to market volatility (5-10%), then I would consider rebalancing.

What do you guys think? What’s does your portfolio of UTs look like?

Cheers.

Well there are a few reasons why it’s there actually. Initially it started due to having the misguided idea that maintaining a bond fund and rebalancing it helps me buy stocks when it’s cheap and lock in profits when it’s overvalued.

However having read up more studies on the matter, due to the long term returns on bonds not being anywhere close to stocks means that it this whole exercise does not actually help you increase returns. Then again there are other articles that say otherwise.

So yea I decided I will just maintain it for now cz while it doesn’t guarantee more optimised returns for the portfolio, it certainly does increase my risk adjusted returns quite significantly, while sacrificing some returns surely but not as much.

I also keep it around get to know how the bond market behaves given that I would someday need to have a larger sum in these assets when I retire, and what better way to experience the market then by getting some skin in the game right?

But yea lastly I think it just serves as a bantam busuk to provide some consolation when the markets are either down or sideways. At least one fund will be in the green, albeit an insignificant amount, but it certainly has a significant psychological impact.

Also yeah I’m quite heavily weighted in Asia now mainly cz of the affin apac dividend fund. I was trying to offset the significant amount of US stocks in it by adding more of the principal apac dynamic growth fund. But yea I want to keep developed markets at 45-35% ideally.

Btw what’s your UT strategy like so far? If you don’t mind sharing that is, no obligations. ✌️


Hey thanks for sharing. That’s quite a bit of exposure in Malaysia I see. Any reason for that? Anticipating some significant growth in the near future?

In my case, the equity funds are predominantly foreign Cz if I consider the money I have growing in epf and my bursa stock portfolio, I would say I’m overly exposed to the Malaysian market (and it hasn’t exactly been the best place for steady long term growth, in recent times at least). So yeah, I’m overly weighted in one country currently, one with a volatile political climate too. Didn’t want to put all my eggs in one basket so to speak. Well I guess it’s not too bad if you go for the local small cap and growth funds in the long term, just that in comparison to some foreign market, I personally feel there’s more certainty for decent growth. Just my speculative opinion tho.

All in how has your portfolio mix been returns wise and all? That being said this was a bad year anyways. My portfolio is down. But they’re UTs so I’m not too concerned. In fact if I had more cash I would dump in more. My stock holdings tho, those are rather concerning.

Oou that’s an interesting mix. You should be getting decent risk adjusted returns on that one right? How as it been so far? So do the REIT funds kinda act as the bonds in your portfolio?



Right, decent enough, similar to asb/epf returns. Is that sufficient for your investment goals/objectives?

Btw are you using the fsm brokerage for the ETFs (is it an international etf or bursa based)?

Hahaha. Yes I totally get the whole trial and error thing. There doesn’t seem to be much content/ books on more in-depth mutual fund strategies etc (in comparison to stocks investing content at least).

Well essentially its any calculation/ratio that considers return in relation to risk taken. The sharpe ratio is one such example (and probably the most commonly used).

Yeah I think REIT funds are good in that sense too, being a whole different asset and all. Having a mix of uncorrelated assets essentially lowers the volatility of a portfolio while either maintaining or maybe even improving returns, so goes the theory at least. But yea, seems like a good mix 👍

Hi guys. What do yal think?:

Scenario:

Target allocation
Equity fund A (25%)
Equity fund B (25%)
Equity fund C (25%)
Equity fund D (25%)

Top up 100 monthly

Current allocation
A 20% (loss -5%)
B 20% (loss -5%)
C 30% (loss -10%)
D 30% (loss -15%)

Would it be better to top up the 100 in the fund that has fallen from your target allocation (A/B) or top up on the fund with the biggest loss to average down (D)?

*Assume all are good funds just going through a bad period.

Just a hypothetical question.

Yes that’s quite true. This doesn’t typically happen. The rare occasion that one my find themselves in such a situation is when you’ve added new funds to the portfolio with little capital to balance it out.

What hurts more is not having any additional funds to capitalise on it. Feels like a colossal waste of opportunity. I have already deployed all my fixed income at the start of the year. Who knew the market would go lower. Hahaha. Well that’s just the nature of investing isn’t it, no one has a crystal ball. We just try to “buy the dip” to the best of our ability/resources and stick to the overall plan.

It’d totally suck if one was retired already and living off their investment portfolio tho. For all everyone else (excluding those nearing retirement) it’s 11.11 in the markets.

Btw what do you guys think of the fact that many personal finance influencers often demonise investing in unit trusts. How have your experiences been with UTs, robos(most are practically mutual funds in a way), other collective investment schemes vs your own direct investments in stocks?

I feel this is really bad as the younger investors would then be led to think that if they just do “the work” they would be the next warren buffet. Meanwhile they’d be missing out on the comppunding effect that is absolutely crucial in the early years. I would generally encourage investors, especially newbies to start out with UTs. Set up the min and dca the minimum in that collective investment scheme. But then eventually if one has extra I feel they should use it to invest in stocks directly. That way they can see if they can do better than a ut. If they can then great! You’re part of that 1%. However, if we are honest about our returns, I’m sure the majority 60-80% of retail investors actually have terrible returns in the stock market, but keep it a secret. There’s nothing wrong with that tho. Learning how to choose a decent ut and dca-ing into them would easily put you miles ahead of your poor performance from pretending to be a fund manager. Nothing wrong with 5-8% annual returns vs hoping to make double digit returns but effectively making -ve returns or 3–6% returns at best.

Back in the days they’d say those who say UTs are great and downplay direct stock investing are probably agents whore trying to make money out of you. However these days it seems to be the reverse. Most of those who trash UTs are probably selling you a course, making lien y from YouTube videos about stocks etc.

Guess the moral of the story is, be honest with yourself, what’s your actual capability. Not everyone is made for stock investing and there’s nothing wrong with that. Just look for the alternative that has the highest chance of success instead of looking for the highest potential outcome.

The statics have been well studied. The majority of investors are plain bad at investing. Most of us here (personal finance nerds hahaha) are what those statistics refer to. Yes it’s us the personal finance nerds, who think we may be the next warren buffet. Reality check tho, these stats are not referring to the general public, cz the general public don’t invest to begin with. Be honest with your capabilities guys. Serious stock investing is a full time job (the job here being studying mostly). To quote William J. Bernstein “ No one in his right mind would walk into the cockpit of an airplane and try to fly it, or into an operating theater and open a belly. And yet they think nothing of managing their retirement assets. I've done all three, and I'm here to tell you that managing money is, in its most critical elements even more demanding than the first two”

That being said, don’t get me wrong, I’m not discouraging people from investing in stocks. I’m all for it actually. I think we should all try. It certainly keeps our ears to the ground. Depdjimg on your performance you’d know which portfolio should be your core investment. What I’m outlining here is bashing UTs and other collective investment schemes.


Hahaha sorry for the unnecessarily long rant that no one asked for guys. Just thinking about how I would’ve done things differently.

Hey thanks for sharing your experience man. 👍 Yeah i totally agree with all 3 points. As for point 3 I currently don’t invest in the US via index ETFs as I’ve not found a cost efficient way to invest monthly via sc regulated platforms. As my monthly investment sum is pretty small. However when my US ut holdings get large enough I may consider looking for ETFs tho. Or perhaps there may be better methods offered by these platforms in the near future. 🤷‍♂️



I think you might be referring to the upfront sales charge that ranges from 4-5% as you rightly pointed out. Personally I don’t think that’s too big an issue as it’s a one off charge. Eg: if you’re buying in for the several years (which I believe we all ought to if it’s an equity fund) an investment of RM100 would immediately be at a loss RM95. Assuming through the ups and downs, on average the fund manages to return +6% p.a. Over a period of 10 years the RM100 would grow past that initial 5% loss to RM170(roughly) - that’s a decent 70% return on your initial.

Also these fees can be further reduced by investing through platforms like fsm and the like. Typically 1.5% in sales charge. In which case you would recover that sales charge even quicker still. Using the same eg as above the investment would be about RM175 - an additional 5% in returns.

But the annual management fees tho. That’s something else. Most charge annually from 1.5-2%. Those really dig in to your potential returns in the very long term. I guess that’s something to consider when investing in UTs.

What would be considered decent portfolio geographic allocation?

I There seem to be plenty of resources online on this, however it’s almost always from a US investor point of view. For them it would make sense to have a big chunk of their investments in the solely in the US or maybe even no international holdings.

What would be the case for us Malaysian investors. Surely we too should have substantial allocation to the US but what else? Also what percentages, any thoughts?

Useful article indeed. Also that’s a nice hack; the managed portfolio allocations would be a good place to start.

Lol. True, can find alternative funds tho. Like the Manulife US fund perhaps.

Hi guys. Was hoping to get your opinions on this. Have been contemplating on how to simplify my small portfolio for awhile now. I feel there’s overlap between funds and my portfolio is less than 10k so doesn’t make much sense to have so many funds at this point too.

It’s currently:
-Affin Hwang select apac ex jp dividend fund
-Principal apac dynamic growth fund
-Principal global titans
-Manulife US equity fund

Proposed change:
-Principal apac dynamic growth fund
-Manulife US equity fund

What do yal think?