StashAway is functionally investing in a broad portfolio of a broad portfolio of stocks + bonds, which means there is going to be volatility where there's ups and downs.

starting off negative is not unusual

remember that this is NOT ASB/EPF/FD, you will see ups and downs

I'll share a snapshot of my account below of the past 3 months which is a combination of all my portfolios to show you the possible volatility.



investing in StashAway means you're prepared to accept this kind of ups and downs.

FYI my 16% SRI has since Sep 2020 given me 3% MWR as of todate, even though I put a large amount at the "all time high" (read: expensive units) right before the market crash in April-May

I suspect a lot of these low SRI people are newbies who only watched StashAway's investment courses and based on the way SA talks about bonds, they assumed bonds = ASB/EPF/SSPN kind of growth where it's only up never down.

This post has been edited by DragonReine: Nov 24 2021, 01:38 PM

Risk yes

it's their way of measuring Value-at-Risk (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_at_risk)

Example, 36% SRI means there's a 1% chance in any given year where the value can drop more than 36%.

8-20% total growth or 8%-20% per annum???? because if you want 8-20% p.a., you're probably better off risking in crypto or some other very high risk high return platform 🤣 StashAway is focused on risk management, not maximise growth, so SA's potential won't be so high. 2020-early 2021 did soar up high but consider something of a rarity in markets to go that high.

This post has been edited by DragonReine: Nov 24 2021, 01:57 PM

I would suggest you look at lee82gx's post to consider the balance of risk and gains:

https://forum.lowyat.net/index.php?showtopi...ost&p=102954500

I agree with this and they've worded it better than I have the time to right now 😅

I would also add that StashAway is
1) still very young, so long term performance is unknown,
2) SA was born from Singapore's environment of low interest gains (aside from CPF)
3) SA's founders subscribe to very western mentality of investment balance

in relative comparison to Malaysia, with our robust social security and forced savings, I do not believe that the way SA's portfolio and investment methods work as of now will really easily reach more than 8%p.a. on their 36% SRI compared to even our local mutual funds (one of my favourite mutual funds that I've invested in has a reported 13% 10-year-annualised return to-date) unless you take the REALLY risky thematic portfolios, largely because the presence of bonds and REITs will dampen the gains somewhat compared to a pure equity index like S&P500

bear that in mind when you are balancing your profit expectations vs risk appetite when it comes to investing in SA

This post has been edited by DragonReine: Nov 24 2021, 03:52 PM

100% agree

my personal opinion, anything lower than the higher-risk index is pointless for retirement savings/long term savings because EPF (and ASB if you're bumiputera) is too powerful 🤣🤣🤣 even if you're an older investor with not many years left to retirement, pumping extra contribution to EPF still earns more than most of the "conservative" portfolios out there in the investment market.

The only main drawback is that self contribution has an annual limit, so if got extra funds then must dump into investments elsewhere. Again, if got ASB, just make use of ASB, if you're conservative investor.

the lower risk SRI portfolios are, to me, really only suitable for people with no access to ASB/SSPN and want to grow their sum of money a little bit more than what other "safe" investments in Malaysia can offer, and maybe a "cheap" way of keeping investments that use USD

(case in point, it's where I put aside some extra-extra money for a home renovation I'm planning to do in a few years, any gains of more than 3% is good enough for me, and I don't want to suddenly lose a big chunk of that money if economy goes to sh*t)

My portfolio only lowered by 2% 🤔 still positive though.

"Annualised", so it's the average of the compounded annual return.

This also means that exteme highs (like 2020s bull run) that is right before lows (2019) will skew things.

But based on my amateur observation their returns are on par with decent-to-good mutual funds over a similar time period and allocation of geographical location.

In the end it's a question of whether you wanna put faith in Freddy's style or not. Again, not that different from mutual funds.

Remember that investment is just as much about faith as it is "logic" because no one can see the future, only predict it.

Small "look back on past 5 years" mini review in SAMY app, can click on the (i) icons to review on the dips.





This post has been edited by DragonReine: Dec 20 2021, 11:26 AM

DCA is just psychological/emotional risk management. Maths-wise, it doesn't lessen loss, it just spreads out the risk a bit, but in the long run it doesn't boost profits or lower loss all that much (especially since as above mentioned each subsequent bullet will diminish in impact once the invested pool gets increasingly bigger)

Sort of the problem of most Chinese tech stocks right now innit? 😅 personally speaking for me it's a known risk, given some insight into PRC politics and culture. Big potential for growth but also unfortunately subject to the whims of CCP which has nearly authoritarian control on everything in China. Many smaller tech companies have started to move base and make headquarters elsewhere.

Whether it'll recover to the ATH is a big question mark, my amateur opinion being that it'll take a good number of years to see the results.

This post has been edited by DragonReine: Dec 21 2021, 06:32 PM

Negative. It's only positive in Ringgit because MYR currency depreciation (SAMY standard accounts invest in USD).

Too many got greedy about the past gains of end of 2020/early 2021 in 36% and started to get salty 😅 then get angry about

remember when some people were complaining that Waheb didn't get the profits of SA, saying Wahed's portfolios are not up to date with profits, and they moved over? vP

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/capita...istribution.asp

https://www.stashaway.my/careers

trying to "buy the dip" in SA is honestly a waste of money because of the processing delay + the weighted allocation, so you not only can't "time" it properly, you also cannot always predict where they'll allocate most of the buy order money to

really just stash and look away is the recommended process for SA

https://www.thesundaily.my/home/stashaway-u...olios-KB8773826

Obviously. China's about as anti-ESG as possible for a big economy with significant effect on international policy and markets 😅

seems like littlegamer is more focused on pure profits rather than what SA actually is:

a platform for ikan bilis/beginners/lazy people to do some investing in overseas equities without exposing themselves to too much volatility and without paying too high fees + forced to make high minimum deposit amount each time,

and as an alternative to park some funds to collect modest profit instead of letting it stagnate in a savings account/fixed deposit.

the entire argument about tracking SP500 (100% equities exposed to a specific region) and comparing that to SA is fundamentally flawed

SP500 outperform? sure, duh, that's the nature of it being 100% equities based on historical data

SA is a completely different product. Cannot just look at profitability and say one is better than the other (unless that's your personal goal, in which case it just means you're not SA's target customer base)

See, this is always going to be a sticking point to you regards of what many others above have explained. I'm not sure what are you looking for here. Validation? A pat on the back saying "oh good job you're so smart, we dumb dumb follow Freddy and we're stupid"?

SA, from its very beginning, NEVER MADE THEIR PRODUCT ABOUT OUTPERFORMING PURE EQUITIES.

Their marketing always emphasize "minimise risk", "diversify", "lower fees than mutual funds", "no minimum deposit limit", "somewhere that you can park funds and not lose much sleep if you choose the right risk index", "no lock in period or age requirement to withdraw like EPF"

We can keep talking about what SA is for but if you're going to keep circulating back to performance, you'll never get a satisfactory answer.

Before the KWEB crash, everyone and their mother was complaining that Akru, Wahed, MYTHEO, BEST etc. did not perform as well as SAMY, and that the above have difficult UI, poor customer service support, limited to transfering funds to certain banks, needing a minimum deposit amount etc. (I've been observing for a few years already).

so your argument about underperforming doesn't really hold water either way, and some people just genuinely prefer to pay a little extra to get a smoother user experience (same logic fly long trip on business class vs AirAsia economy seat, obviously one saves money but for some the value of comfort > the cost savings)

there's always winners and there's always losers in investing

about the only thing an investor can personally control is how and where they invest and more importantly if their investment is right for their mental and financial well-being