Investing In Overseas Markets With Your CPF?

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Imagine investing in Apple shares using your CPF Investment Account (CPF-IA).

Sounds too good to be true? It is, to a certain extent.

Due to strict CPF-OA (Ordinary Account) rules allowing only certain locally listed shares, it is almost impossible to use these funds to invest in major US large cap stocks. While direct ownership is unavailable, indirect investment is possible through unit trusts (UTs) or investment-linked insurance policy (ILP) funds, which may include foreign securities like Apple depending on the funds’ investment mandate.

UTs and ILPs are categorised as Professionally Managed Products (PMP) under the CPF investment scheme, and they have a higher threshold for allowed CPF-OA investible funds compared to shares and gold.

While I shall not touch on the insurance component of ILPs as they are individualised products, their funds within share similar properties to that of UT’s. A common gripe about UTs is the deemed higher expense ratios vis-à-vis their exchange traded fund counterparts. However, in view of the CPF-OA investing rules, the choice of investment vehicles available, and the higher PMP investible limit, UTs are probably the main way to go if one wants to go beyond the 35% stock and 10% gold limits. 

Before going along this path, one needs to consider a few points before putting his/her CPF-OA to work. I had written two blogposts (here and here) to assist in the decision.

Disclosure

The Bedokian is vested in Apple, and invested in unit trusts via a robo-advisor with CPF-OA funds.

Disclaimer

A Relook At The Four U.S. Counters

Back in 2014 (read here), I had researched and concluded on four U.S. counters which were relatively suitable for newbie and seasoned investors thinking of stepping into the U.S. markets for the very first time: the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY), Berkshire Hathaway Class B (BRK.B), Apple (AAPL) and Alphabet (GOOG/GOOGL, which I would use GOOGL for this post). These were selected based on two points: representation of the U.S. markets in general (SPY and BRK.B) and being proxies for the technological and innovation might of the United States (AAPL and GOOGL).

(Picture credit: rabbimichoel from pixabay.com)

 

A casual dinner conversation with a relative had brought up the question of their current relevance and a decade down the road. The concerns brought up included issues such as the catchup on artificial intelligence (AI) (AAPL), large language models (LLMs) displacing search engines (GOOGL), the changing of the guard (BRK.B) and the possible decline of U.S. exceptionalism (SPY). 

It is valid to have such concerns, as recent narratives were going on about these issues, too. I will briefly go through each of these counters and my thoughts on them for the future.

S&P 500 (via SPY ETF)

While there are a few ways to view the United States market, I use the S&P 500 as the proxy mainly due to the diversification of sectors and companies. Never mind the huge make-up and hard carry by the Magnificent 7 (or 6, depending on how one views them), it reflects the microcosm of the overall U.S. economy.

The direction of the trade policies and geopolitical decisions pursued by the current administration had led to observers and analysts to believe that it could result in the alienation of the U.S. (including the shrinking reserve currency status of the U.S. Dollar), and subsequently the gradual loss of American exceptionalism. However, the U.S. is still a nexus encompassing the various stages of the economy, for their companies hold substantial control of the primary (extraction of raw materials), secondary (manufacturing) and tertiary (services and knowledge based), not necessarily occurring within its territories.

To add, I had presented my case for the above points (see here) and my conclusion is that the U.S. is still investible for now.

Berkshire Hathaway (via BRK.B)

BRK.B is the other proxy for the U.S. economy as not only it has listed companies in its portfolio, but also non-listed ones which represents the heart of American enterprise. The focus, however, is not on this aspect, but another: the transition.

BRK.B is synonymous with the two investing greats: Warren Buffett and the late Charlie Munger, and it had been so for the last five decades. With the announcement by Buffett stepping down at the end of 2025 and handing over the reins to his successor Greg Abel, the main issue would be whether the successor is able to follow and fill the shoes of the predecessors.

As I had mentioned here and here, there may be some deviations in investment methodology and decision-making process that is expected when someone new takes over. I would be observing BRK.B for a few years after the handover is complete.

Apple (AAPL)

News about AAPL’s catch-up on artificial intelligence (AI) has been going around, so much so that they were often compared to the person left behind on the pier while the proverbial AI ship with everyone else on board (e.g. Microsoft, Amazon, etc.) had sailed away. Tim Cook, AAPL’s chief executive officer, had just gave a speech rallying staff to go all-out on AI and make up for lost ground in the field.

Despite pessimism about AAPL’s not-so-wow-factor products and the not-so-impressive growth rate shown in the previous quarters, the last quarter results gave some signs of improvement, beating estimates in revenue, earnings per share, iPhone revenue and Mac revenue, the latter two’s margins not seen since Dec 2021. Whilst figures were not provided, AAPL had reported their installed base of active users had reached an all-time high.

With a growing user base in spite of being a laggard in AI features, I opine that AAPL is light years from being declared obsolete. They are primarily a hardware and services company, and they could possibly look for (and acquire) external sources for AI capabilities rather than develop in-house as what others had done.

Alphabet (via GOOGL)

For a moment GOOGL was written off as a “has-been” with the prediction of LLMs eating GOOGL’s lunch in the search space, which did not happen very much yet. Instead, they adapted and upped the ante by placing their Gemini LLM in the search results, thus showing both search and LLM as complimentary, rather than the latter being a substitute. 

Also, GOOGL is more than just search, and they have other business segments like Google Cloud and YouTube. The Google Cloud revenue had gone up 32% year-on-year in the last quarter, which is expected as the trend for cloud storage is increasing, partially attributed to the voracious appetite for AI applications in which LLMs are included. YouTube is seen by many as the competitor to Netflix, who themselves had beaten other streaming services like Walt Disney and Amazon.

GOOGL is considered to be one of the undervalued counters among the Magnificent 7 or 6, so business wise and share price wise, they may have more runway to go.

Conclusion

Slightly more than ten years had passed since my conclusion back in 2014 on the four counters, and my take is that they are still relevant for minimally the next decade, barring any catastrophic or black swan events happening. Due diligence and further analysis are necessary before entering as my interpretations of the four may be different from yours. Past performance is not indicative of future results, and we can only “guesstimate” what may happen in the years to come based on available data and information.

Disclosure

The Bedokian is vested in SPY, BRK.B, AAPL and GOOGL.

Disclaimer

All About Price: The Price Ratios

This is part of my intermittent series on price, one of the most important and commonly encounters considerations in investing and trading. For this post, I will discuss about the various financial ratios that has price as a component.

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There are five main types of ratios with price as a major component, which I let Gemini AI handle the descriptions (output displayed in a different font):

1. Price-to-Earnings (P/E) Ratio:

• Formula: Market Price per Share / Earnings Per Share (EPS) 
• Interpretation: A higher P/E ratio suggests that investors are willing to pay more for each unit of earnings, potentially indicating overvaluation or high growth expectations. A lower P/E ratio may suggest undervaluation or lower growth expectations. 
• Example: If a company's stock price is $50 and its EPS is $5, the P/E ratio is 10 (50/5). 

2. Price-to-Book (P/B) Ratio:

• Formula: Market Price per Share / Book Value per Share
• Interpretation: Compares the market price of a stock to its book value (assets minus liabilities). A P/B ratio above 1 suggests the market values the company higher than its net asset value.
• Example: If a company's stock price is $20 and its book value per share is $15, the P/B ratio is 1.33 (20/15). 

3. Price-to-Sales (P/S) Ratio:

• Formula: Market Capitalization / Total Sales (or Price per Share / Sales per Share)
• Interpretation: Indicates how much investors are willing to pay for each dollar of a company's revenue. Lower P/S ratios may suggest undervaluation or that the company is not effectively utilizing its sales.
• Example: If a company's market capitalization is $100 million and its total sales are $50 million, the P/S ratio is 2 (100/50). 

4. Price-to-Cash Flow (P/CF) Ratio:

• Formula: Market Price per Share / Cash Flow per Share
• Interpretation: Measures how much investors are willing to pay for each dollar of a company's cash flow. It can be a more reliable indicator than P/E ratio because cash flow is harder to manipulate than earnings.
• Example: If a company's stock price is $60 and its cash flow per share is $10, the P/CF ratio is 6 (60/10). 

5. Price-to-Earnings-to-Growth (PEG) Ratio:

• Formula: P/E Ratio / Expected Earnings Growth Rate
• Interpretation: Helps to assess whether a stock's P/E ratio is justified by its future earnings growth. A PEG ratio less than 1 is generally considered favorable, suggesting the stock may be undervalued relative to its growth potential.
• Example: If a company's P/E ratio is 20 and its expected earnings growth rate is 25%, the PEG ratio is 0.8 (20/25). 

 

These ratios are usually available from most stock screener sites, or one could calculate the numbers based from the stock market prices and financial statements.

Generally, the lower these ratios are, the better the company’s valuation is, ceteris paribus, though a whole lot of relativity and context are needed in an actual analysis. They should be utilized as a guideline, not as a major dealbreaker when selecting companies to invest in.

The All-In-One Price Ratio

Conversely, during my specialist diploma course days (read here for more details about my view and experience of the course), a lecturer had briefly spoke about using the various price ratios and aggregate them to a score, which I dubbed it as the “all-in-one price ratio”. While I did not get more details on this other than a short mention, perhaps this may be my next side project in deriving “the number”.

Check out the other post in my All About Price series.

All About Price: Introduction & Valuation of Value 

All About Price: Buyer/Seller Remorse and Premorse

All About Price: The 52-Week High/Low

All About Price: Reversion To The Mean

All About Price: Bottom Fishing

All About Price: The (Price) Margin Of Safety

The Most Expensive Show-And-Tell

On 2 Apr 2025, dubbed as “Liberation Day” by the current U.S. administration, a “show-and-tell” by the incumbent president on the imposition of reciprocal tariff rates on every possible nation and territory in the world, had wiped off at least USD 2.4 trillion worth of market cap from Wall Street¹.

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Apple plunged close to 15.8% over two days, and Amazon’s price down by around 12.6% over the same period, due to their supply chains intertwining closely with China, one of the main targets of the tariff drive. Across the global markets, indices and prices were down in various magnitudes over the uncertainties of the impact that the tariffs would bring.

In this post, I would not delve into the intricacies and implications of the tariff rates, and the main macroeconomic reasons why the U.S. is doing this, as these are factors way beyond our control, I will instead focus from the investor side of things.

Same, But Different, But Still Same

For those who had invested at least for the past six years, this plunging market scenario is like the one that was encountered during the COVID-19 crisis back in Mar 2020. Some may argue that the context of both situations is different, i.e., one was a pandemic where no one could predict when it would end, whereas the other is a deliberate economic event where somebody may know when it could end, these periods marked good moments to enter counters that one may have been waiting for, and/or to average down current holdings due to their relatively cheaper valuations.

And it seems that a lot of investors are learning this “buy the dip”; the day after Liberation Day on 3 Apr, retail and individual investors made USD 4.7 billion worth of net equity purchases (difference between bought and sold), the highest in 10 years². Yes, I am one of them.

Good Companies Tend To Be Resilient

While every equity security is screaming “cheap cheap” now, not all are equal; some may turn out well and become multi-baggers in the years to come, but there are a few whose prices could remain at a low level for longer periods. This is where the concept of company fundamentals come into play, and those with wide healthy financial numbers like good free cash flows, low gearing, etc., and strong moats like reliable customer bases and near monopolistic products/services, etc. would tend to pull through.

Fundamental analysis is needed to see if the companies are resilient. For one’s current holdings, a periodic review may be sufficient, while a full one is necessary if prospecting for new counters to invest in.

We Cannot Tell The Future

Will the tariffs be reduced? How much lower will the S&P 500 go to? What would be the bottom price for Apple?

My only answer to them is four words: I do not know. As oft mentioned by me, predictions, especially the correct outcome at the right moment, are short of impossible to state. In terms of the timing to go into the market, one can use indicators (valuations, price signals, etc.) as a gauge of whether to buy into the company/index exchange traded funds (ETFs). If one is on the path of passive investing with periodic rebalancing, and/or following a disciplined periodic approach of buying into the securities, then just continue with it.

 

The last best time to invest in a dip was five years ago. The second-best time is (probably) now.

Stay calm and invested.

Disclosure

The Bedokian is vested in Apple and the S&P 500 via SPY ETF.

Disclaimer

1 – Wynne, Alan. Lessons from “Liberation Day”: A guide to tariffs. J.P. Morgan Wealth Management. 4 Apr 2025. https://www.jpmorgan.com/insights/markets/top-market-takeaways/tmt-lessons-from-liberation-day-a-guide-to-tariffs (accessed 5 Apr 2025)

2 – Gottsegen, Gordon. Individual investors made a record $4.7 billion in stock purchases Thursday as new tariffs pummeled markets. Marketwatch. 4 Apr 2025. https://www.marketwatch.com/story/individual-investors-net-bought-a-record-4-7-billion-worth-of-stocks-on-thursday-as-new-tariffs-pummeled-markets-a82a4a8c (accessed 5 Apr 2025)

Sell Banks And Buy REITs?

I have had heard of the above mantra from chat groups and online blogs, possibly due to the perception that banks are (deemed) overpriced, and the recovery of real estate investment trusts (REITs) are in progress as observed from price movements and analyst reports.

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In portfolio management terms, this is rebalancing, where assets of different asset classes/regions/sectors are bought and sold to maintain the desired portfolio make-up. Within the action of rebalancing, however, there are variations in its execution; on one end some do it passively and periodically, while on the other end some do it actively and opportunistically to capture gains from anticipated events and news.

Back on the action of selling banks and buying REITs, it would be dependent on one’s portfolio, investment strategy and methodology used, and which part of the above described active-passive spectrum one is at. Depending on each investor’s circumstance, it may not be necessary to sell one and buy the other. For our case, as we are still in the accumulation phase, we rebalance by injecting capital, thus we buy both banks and REITs.

Providing more context and detail, we had recently deployed into OCBC when its price showed weakness during the middle of March 2025; this purchase is for averaging up our current holdings. For REITs, we had been nibbling them since interest rates started to spike in 2022, with the knowledge that every asset class would go through highs and lows in cycles (my oft stated “Sunday” and “Monday” moments).

Hence, to sum it all up, an investor needs to take stock (pun intended) whether the advice of “sell banks and buy REITs” is suitable for his/her investment philosophy and portfolio situation. If the advice is sound, then it must be rationally substantiated with reasons such as the purpose of doing so, the justification of fundamentals, etc. Following blind advice without facts and context is akin to listening to jumping into the deep end of the pool blindfolded and with hands tied, which someone with a sane mind would not do in real life.

Disclosure

The Bedokian is vested in OCBC.

Disclaimer

Being Opportunistic In the Past Weeks

Uncertainties caused by the threat of tariffs (implied or about to be implemented), and a slew of other minor reasons, had spooked the markets somewhat, with the S&P 500 index down more than 4% year-to-date. A down market is the time to look for bargains, and ample opportunities to buy in counters at relatively less expensive prices and/or to average down on securities that one may have already owned.

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Yes, this smack of the characteristic called market timing, which is usually frowned upon as the future price movement is a big unknown. However, any price is a good price if the investor felt the fundamentals and/or valuations had hit the right spot.

To summarise, since February, we had added the following five assets into our Portfolio Multiverse:

• Alphabet (Bedokian Portfolio)

• Nvidia (Bedokian Portfolio)

• OCBC (CPF Portfolio)

• NikkoAM-StraitsTrading Asia ex Japan REIT ETF (Bedokian Portfolio)

• Cryptocurrencies Bitcoin and Ether (Trading Portfolio)

Frankly, more counters were planned to be added, such as Frasers Centrepoint Trust, Frasers Logistics & Commercial Trust, and some bond ETFs (e.g., ABF Singapore Bond Index Fund, Nikko AM SGD Investment Grade Corporate Bond ETF, etc.) that we had in our holdings. However, these counters had seen a rise from around mid-March that, in my opinion, was possibly due to capital shift and asset class/regional rotation into Singapore assets, among other things.

There are always buying opportunities abound in the markets, depending on the economic situation, asset classes and market sentiments.

Disclosure

The Bedokian is vested in the mentioned counters/securities/assets in this blog post.

Disclaimer

The Thing About Asset Class Correlations

In portfolio management, the term “correlation” has been mentioned many times as its very characteristic formed the basis of diversification among the asset classes. For those who are new to investing, correlation is “a statistical measure that determines how assets move in relation to each other”¹. As the various asset classes behave differently during differing market and economic conditions, their relative price movements with one another would be different given a set period or snapshot of time.

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However, there has been a notion that correlation in terms of price and returns is a zero-sum game. For example, in a portfolio consisting of two asset classes (let us call them A and B) and they are negatively correlated with each other, the assumption is that if the price of A rises, the price of B would drop, vice versa. Yes, that is correct, but only half; the correlation numbers are not fixed, and there are times where A and B gain together, and at times where both suffered losses together.

As stated above that correlation is a statistical measure, it is being defined by the time frame used. If in a day, the price of A and B moves in tandem, whether up or down, they are positively correlated with each other for that moment. However, if A and B moves differently from each other over a longer period, then their correlation may be less positive, or possibly even negative, for that said period.

Hence, it is not surprising to see A and B were having a negative correlation over set time, and yet both had positive returns. Providing a real-world example, I would use two asset classes that were conventionally opposites in the correlation thing, equities and gold (see Figure 1):

 

Asset Class	VTI	GLD	Annualised Return
Equities (VTI)	1.00	-0.14	23.81%
Gold (GLD)	-0.14	1.00	26.66%

 

Fig. 1: Asset class correlations of equities (represented by Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF (VTI) and gold (represented by SPDR Gold Shares ETF (GLD), 1 Jan 2024 to 31 Dec 2024, using monthly returns correlation basis. Source: Portfolio Visualizer.

 

The Bedokian’s Take

While correlation forms part of the overall concept of diversification, for the retail investor, my take is to be aware of it and how it works. Leave the correlation numbers crunching to the academics, analysts and financial bloggers like me to provide useful insights for all. 

Another trivia, which may come as a surprise to you, is that the main cause of correlation comes from you and me (sort of), and the rest of the participants in the financial markets. I will provide a couple of links under Related Posts below to understand why this is so.

Stay calm and stay invested.

Related posts:

Know This, And You Are Halfway Knowing How The Market Works 

Diversification Is Dead! Long Live Diversification! 

 

1 – Edwards, John. Why Market Correlation Matters. Investopedia. 31 Oct 2022. https://www.investopedia.com/articles/financial-advisors/022516/4-reasons-why-market-correlation-matters.asp#:~:text=Correlation%20is%20a%20statistical%20measure,in%20relation%20to%20each%20other (accessed 23 Feb 2025)

All Hyped Up: Banks And Gold

Recently, most investment online and offline talk that I have been reading are about two things: local banks and gold. The run-up of share prices and bumper dividends of DBS and UOB (and probably OCBC who will be announcing on 26 Feb 2025), and the spike of gold inching towards the landmark USD 3,000 price level, had caught the attention of mainstream investors wanting a piece of the action pie.

A common anecdotal indicator on whether something is being hyped up is when non-investors, like the oft-mentioned friendly neighbourhood barber/hairdresser, start to talk to you on the hyped asset. This is a strong, but not the ultimate, sign of an overhyped or overheated market, in general and/or for the asset concerned.

However, looking at the fundamentals of the local banks and gold, in my opinion there is still some potential upside; let us start with banks. 

 

The Big Three

 

(Picture credit: Jason Goh from pixabay.com)

 

All three banks are experiencing revenue growth over the past three years, which results in higher valuations. Figure 1 shows a snapshot of selected valuation ratios of DBS, OCBC and UOB.

Banks	DBS	OCBC	UOB
Price/Book Ratio (P/B)	1.93	1.38	1.29
Price/Earnings-to-Growth Ratio (5 year expected) (PEG)	8.85	2.61	1.58
Forward Price/Earnings Ratio (P/E)	11.95	10.31	9.78

 

Fig.1: Selected current valuation ratios for DBS, OCBC and UOB. Source: Yahoo Finance as of 22 Feb 2025.

Based on the numbers alone, UOB is currently the “cheapest” among the three, but before concluding, a deeper dive is needed because each bank’s business model and geographical exposure is different. On the latter point, for instance, UOB’s foreign concentration is more in the Southeast Asia region, while DBS’ is skewed into Greater China, and OCBC’s is mixed between Greater China and Southeast Asia. Hence, in conducting fundamental analysis (FA), do not just focus on the valuations and price alone; a holistic approach is required, i.e., the Bedokian Portfolio’s three-level FA method¹.

Being the only major financial institutions in Singapore, the banks represented its economic stability and health. As Singapore is one of the top five financial hubs in the world, DBS, OCBC and UOB, in my opinion, are positioned for further growth.

 

The Shiny Yellow Metal

 

(Picture credit: Soofia Tailor from pixabay.com)

 

Since the beginning of 2024, gold had broken the resistive USD 2,000 mark and went on a steep curve upwards towards the USD 3,000 line, resulting in a near 50% growth rate for the past year. There are a few reasons why gold prices spiked, like the current geopolitical tensions (trade wars and actual wars), economic uncertainty, hedging against inflation, central bank purchases, etc., and all these factors are intertwined with one another.

Unlike other asset classes which use securitization (i.e., legal “pieces of paper”) to denote ownership value, which may have a (very low) risk of being made worthless, gold (and other non-perishable hard commodities like metals) holds value on its own, depending on its demand and supply. Between 1971, when gold was delinked from the US dollar, and Mar 2024, gold had an average annual return of 7.98%². Despite losing out to equities in terms of returns over the same period, it is a finite resource, and its worth would go higher as time goes by.

 

Is It Too Late?

Another way to put this question is: what is the right price to enter. True that prices of banks and gold had gone up significantly over the past year, and there is a possibility of investors suffering from buyer remorse due to a possible fall in price after vesting in them. Although this can be seen as a form of averaging up for those who are vested and having the price margin of safety, for new entrants these deemed “high prices” proved a challenge.

The important thing here is to gain a toehold on them first by investing a token amount, and then average up or down from there. We do not know which direction the price movements will be, but if they are fundamentally sound going forward, then this is one possible way of starting on them.

Disclosure

The Bedokian is vested in OCBC and physical gold.

Disclaimer

1 – The Bedokian Portfolio (2^nd Ed), Ch 11

2 – Average annual return of gold and other assets worldwide from 1971 to 2024. Statista. 25 Jun 2024. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1061434/gold-other-assets-average-annual-returns-global/ (accessed 22 Feb 2025)