Showing posts with label HourGlass. Show all posts
Showing posts with label HourGlass. Show all posts

03 October 2016

Portfolio of 8 Singapore Stocks - Oct 2016

It's been over a year since I started a Portfolio of 8 Singapore Stocks on 28 Aug 2015 for fun. How has that theoretical $100,000 portfolio fared after all the gyrations of 2016?

Stock
No. of 
Shares
28 Aug 15
3 Oct 16
Value
OCBC
1,300
$9.280
$8.650
$11,245
Keppel
1,700
$7.200
$5.300
$9,010
M1
4,200
$2.920
$2.440
$10,248
Boustead
14,600
$0.855
$0.815
$11,899
Kingsmen
15,200
$0.820
$0.650
$9,880
VICOM
2,100
$6.000
$5.720
$12,012
HourGlass
17,000
$0.735
$0.650
$11,050
GKGoh
14,900
$0.840
$0.810
$12,740

The portfolio is now $88,084 (dividends not considered) and completely red. It's been a complete wash-out. I guess if I am a fund manager, I'm pretty much out of a job by now.


At the start of the year, I had stretched my neck out with a prediction that the portfolio would be positive by the end of 2016. Looks like I have stuck my neck out a tad? It's been a fairly horrible year. 

With only two months till the end of the year, is there still hope yet?  Perhaps a bridge too far? Time to recall the 1st British Airborne Division from Arnhem. The ghosts of Operation Market-Garden beckons.

Disclaimer: I have not bought such a portfolio on those dates. I am only doing this exploration for fun. But it is true that I do have all these stocks in my holdings and did buy more of some of them during Aug-Sep 2015. And I am certainly not clairvoyant, so I can't predict the future!

Related:
Portfolio of 8 Singapore Stocks - 31 Dec 2015

06 January 2016

Portfolio of 8 Singapore Stocks - 31 Dec 2015

On 28 Aug 2015, I started exploring a portfolio of 8 Singapore stocks with a value of ~$100,000 (Portfolio of 8 Singapore Stocks). Although the actual value would have been $99,126, I am assuming for simplicity it would be $100,000 after accounting for transaction costs.

How has it fared? It's been four months and here's how it looked like on 31 Dec 2015:

Stock
No. of 
Shares
28 Aug 2015
31 Dec 2015
Value
OCBC
1,300
$9.280
$8.800
$11,440
Keppel
1,700
$7.200
$6.510
$11,067
M1
4,200
$2.920
$2.720
$11,424
Boustead
14,600
$0.855
$0.835
$12,191
Kingsmen
15,200
$0.820
$0.670
$10,184
VICOM
2,100
$6.000
$6.020
$12,642
HourGlass
17,000
$0.735
$0.785
$13,345
GKGoh
14,900
$0.840
$0.810
$12,069

The portfolio is now $94,362 (dividends not considered) and overall deeply in the red after 4 months. Obviously not making any money. The split is now 2-6 in favour of the losers. HourGlass continues to hold the fort positively alongside VICOM. But everyone else is underwater.

Market sentiments continue to be bleak, so I don't think it's going to see daylight anytime soon. But perhaps it is a good time for more fishing when pessimism is most severe?


It is the new year. So I'll stretch my neck out with a prediction: that the portfolio will be positive by the end of 2016.

Disclaimer: I have not bought such a portfolio on those dates. I am only doing this exploration for fun. But it is true that I do have all these stocks in my holdings and did buy more of some of them during Aug-Sep 2015. And I am certainly not clairvoyant, so I can't predict the future!

Related:
8 SGX Companies to Keep Watch On

31 December 2015

A Review of Investments for 2015

2015 has actually turned out to be a horrendous year, or a wonderful year, depending on how you look at it as an investor. Checking against the STI, I realised it has actually suffered a -14.3% dropped compared to this time last year. Taking into account 3% of dividends which the STI index would not have accounted for, that would actually be -11.3% net in terms of total returns.

So if you're sitting on a 11.3% loss, you're pretty much doing market normal. You're normal. On the other hand, if you've been buying throughout the year when the market dropped, it's probably going to turn out great in the longer run. That is, provided you didn't buy a bunch of junk! You had a lot of guts and I wish you success! You're probably abnormal.

My stock investment has returned an IRR of -1.2% for 2015 inclusive dividends reinvested into the portfolio. So I guess I should take some satisfaction that I have outperformed the market for the 6th year running. Can I gloat somewhat?

However, my long term IRR has continued to slide: from ~20% (2012-13, 4-5 years), to 17.3% (2014, 6 years), and now ~12% (2015, 7 years). A case of reversion to mean? Still, 12% over 7 years is not a bad long term performance. I'm consoling myself.

The shares portfolio is taking on a more global outlook as I've started investing into other regional ETFs (esp. Europe, Asia-Pac and Japan) on top of my current holdings of Singapore and US shares. If this was a fund management company, I should probably use some other global benchmarks. But I'm not, so I will continue to reference STI as my benchmark, because that's what my opportunity cost is. I'm only accountable to myself.

Bought:
  Anheuser Busch (US)
  ARA Asset Mgt
  Aspial (bonds)
  Boustead
  Capitacom Trust
  Capitaland
  CIMB Asiapac Div ETF
  Exxon Mobil (US)
  Global Logistic
  HongKong Land
  JMH
  Keppel
  Lyxor Europe10 ETF
  Lyxor Japan10 ETF
  M1
  OCBC
  Second Chance
  The Hour Glass
  Union Pacific
  YZG
  Zagro Asia

Rights Issues Subscribed:
  ARA Asset Mgt

Sold:
  nothing!

Lots of buying, not much selling. To be precise, I've sold nothing throughout the year. I've been a stooge. Gave nothing away.

Dividend income grew marginally to $11,168 for 2015. This would have been higher of course, except that I chose to accept all options offered in the form of scrip dividends (i.e. additional shares in lieu of cash) as per previous year. I'm too lazy to figure out what the exact dividend amount would have been. But I estimate it would likely be in the region of $14,000 for the shares portfolio. That's not enough to live off my lifestyle on, yet.

But from an overall perspective, the total portfolio of shares, unit trust, investment-linked and cash/bonds has finally breached the 7-figure zone. The journey is progressing well. The point of "inflexion" (a.k.a. financial independence) is coming.


Despite a tumultuous 2015, here's wishing you a wonderful 2016 next. Happy New Year!

31 October 2015

Portfolio of 8 Singapore Stocks - 28 Oct 2015 [updated to correct error]

On 28 Aug 2015, I started exploring a portfolio of 8 Singapore stocks with a value of ~$100,000 (Portfolio of 8 Singapore Stocks). Although the actual value would have been $99,126 (without considering transaction costs), I am assuming $100,000 for simplicity. You could think of the difference as the transaction costs.

How has it fared since? In truth, two months is way too short a time to be meaningful. Nonetheless, here's how it looks:

Stock
No. of 
Shares
28 Aug 2015
28 Oct 2015
Value
OCBC
1,300
$9.280
$9.200
$11,960
Keppel
1,700
$7.200
$7.160
$12,172
M1
4,200
$2.92
$2.870
$12,054
Boustead
14,600
$0.855
$0.955
$13,943
Kingsmen
15,200
$0.820
$0.780
$11,856
VICOM
2,100
$6.000
$6.150
$12,915
HourGlass
17,000
$0.735
$0.740
$12,580
GKGoh
14,900
$0.840
$0.825
$12,293

Thanks to CSCCC who highlighted that I had made a mistake with M1's price on 28 Aug 2015, I have adjusted the error as indicated in yellow highlights above.

The portfolio is now $99,723, so it really hasn't moved the needle over the two elapsed months. This valuation does not take into account any dividends. The split is 3-5 between the winners and losers (as indicated in red above). The only significant winner has been Kingsmen.  So it looks pretty flat-line for now and in need of some resuscitation.


Disclaimer: I have not bought such a portfolio on those dates. I am only doing this exploration for fun. But it is true that I do have all these stocks in my holdings and did buy more of some of them during Aug-Sep 2015.

Related:
8 SGX Companies to Keep Watch On

28 August 2015

Portfolio of 8 Singapore Stocks - Aug 2015 [updated 31 Oct 2015]

On 14 Aug 2015, as the Singapore market trended down, I highlighted 8 Singapore companies to keep watch on. I figured that an opportunity would come soon if the downwards trend continued. Indeed, it came pretty suddenly on 24 Aug 2015 (see Playing with the bears of 2015).

While the STI never quite hit the official 20% bear territory, it was pretty close, reaching -19.9%? A 0.1% difference is perhaps just a technicality. Many stocks reached their low point that day.


I thought it might be interesting to see how a portfolio made up of these 8 stocks would fare over time. I assumed that a reasonable investor wouldn't have caught the lowest point to buy, but would have delayed a few days to watch how things unfolded before jumping in.

So, taking reference from the prices a few days later on 28 Aug 2015, here's how a $100,000 portfolio would look like for this portfolio of 8. No REITs nor business trusts. But the 8 are broadly diversified.

Stock
Number of Shares
28 Aug 2015
Dividend Yield
Price to Book ratio
OCBC
1,300
$9.280
4.03%
1.1
Keppel
1,700
$7.200
7.02%
1.15
M1
4,200
$2.920
6.43%
7.08
Boustead
14,600
$0.855
4.73%
1.46
Kingsmen
15,200
$0.820
4.43%
1.59
VICOM
2,100
$6.000
2.93%
3.82
HourGlass
17,000
$0.735
3.06%
1.23
GKGoh
14,900
$0.840
4.73%
0.73

In working out the above, I did not take into account transaction fees. The number of shares were based on approximately $12,500 for each stock, rounded to the minimum lot size of 100. With that, the whole portfolio would have cost $99,126. I guess if transaction costs had been factored in, it would have come close to $100,000 anyway.

Let's see how this fares over the next few years with a buy and hold strategy.

--
1 Sep 2015 ...

I forgot to indicate the dividend yield and their price-to-book (P/B) ratio of the stock previously. So I have updated into the above table, but these are based on the data on 1 Sep 2015.

These are all dividend yielding stocks, and mostly with P/B below 2.0. The exceptions were M1 and VICOM which had much higher P/B. These probably reflect the premium that M1 commands as a Telco and likewise VICOM in their vehicle inspection role.

I'm drawing inspiration from Teh Hooi Ling's article where she mentioned a finding from historical analysis that stocks with a healthy dividend yield over P/B ratio tended to perform better over time.
--

31 Oct 2015 ...

The data for M1 was amended due to earlier error. Changes are highlighted in yellow.

14 August 2015

8 SGX Companies to Keep Watch On

In my recent interview by Giraffe, I mentioned several stocks that I felt may be worth keeping a close watch on due to various challenges that they are facing. So I thought I may elaborate a bit further on these.

OCBC. They have certain exposure to China and is hoping to grow its market there. With China experiencing some slow down, it will be affected. But my view is that a slow down does not mean that China will come to a halt. Business will continue to ebb and grow. It is a huge emerging market that is hard to ignore. And they will need capital (loans) to support business operations. Cash is king.

Keppel. A significant part of Keppel's business is in the marine sector which is facing challenges from the declining price of oil. Much of the oil around the world are moved by maritime shipping. There has been few new orders, although it does have a sizeable order book to carry it forward. If the situation persists, painful layoffs may well be necessary. Such layoffs could result in some loss of capabilities for the future. Since Choo Chiau Beng stepped down as its CEO, the new management team has had much to deal with.

M1. M1 is largely dependent on the domestic market telco market, unlike Singtel which has an international market for diversification. With a 4th entrant coming into the local telco scene, it would face cannibalisation from the competition. But the question is, will the 4th player survive? M1 has also been the first off the block to introduce new service schemes (innovation?) to try to take the market in the meantime.

Boustead. A part of its business comes from the oil and gas, as well as property development. Both of which are facing difficulties. The oil and gas challenge is similar to Keppel's problem. With a slowdown in population growth, the need for housing in land-limited Singapore is going to slow down. There is also a lot of competition from the many companies in Singapore. They are experiencing forex downside given the extensive business operations in Malaysia (rapidly depreciating M$) and Australia (A$ is almost the same as S$ now).

Kingsmen. If there is slow down in regional economies, resulting in less business shop upgrades and MICE events, then they are likely to experience difficulties in growing their revenue. But they seem to have a strong reputation. Good branding. The emergence of more and more theme parks in the region, as well as upgrades at existing ones, are continued business opportunities for Kingsmen.

VICOM. There are some on the shrinkage of car population with many cars due to replace those at the end of 10 years. As car owners replace with new cars, they will not need to go to VICOM that soon. Maybe there will be near term shrinkage in revenue. But VICOM is dominant and car inspections are legally required. All VICOM need to do is to just raise its charges?

HourGlass. Luxury goods would most certainly benefit from a large newly rich Chinese market, hungry for symbolism. But the stamp down on corruption in China has made many self-conscious, and an economic slow down would likely create further reason for pause and caution. The company is also in the midst of transition from its founders to the next generation.

GKGoh. It's businesses operations in Europe and Australia would probably be affected by the foreign exchange rates when translated into the S$ currency. Its Boardroom subsidiary (itself a SGX stock) seems to dominate in providing services to many SGX companies, providing a stable revenue stream.

But all the above are likely things that will blow over as things reach equilibrium with time (reversion to mean?). Demand for the goods and services will still be there to provide growth. Ultimately, the businesses will thrive, so long as they are not experiencing the "Kodak moment" and continue to be led by responsible management teams that do not engage in any shenanigan.

A ship full of bears

This week in particular has been an "excitable" week, with the market in a sea of red for a couple of days. Looks like a ship full of bears. But I'm a contrarian. The market goes down, I'm excited. So I'm buying. Gradually. Because I can't be sure the market wouldn't go down even further.

Disclaimer: Do conduct your own research and make your own decisions. I do not possess any all-seeing eye that claims to predict the future. So I am not a clairvoyant. Above is just a personal view of things.

28 April 2015

My Singapore Team of Dividend Stocks 2015

My first 11 team of dividend shares have remained largely unchanged over the past year.


Goalkeeper

(1) OCBC remains my stalwart to guard the goalpost. An increasing interest rate environment can only benefit the banks.

Defenders

My defence is built around Real Estate Investment Trusts (REIT) in the form of (2) Capita Commercial Trust, (3) Capita Retail China Trust and (4) Mapletree Industrial Trust.  That gives me 3 REITs covering commercial, retail and industrial properties, with some exposure to China. 

My fourth defender is (5) Vicom.  a proxy play for car ownership in Singapore. It could be facing some windy resistance as there are supposedly less cars that require routine inspections over the next 3 years. But will there ever be less cars in Singapore? Not in my view. So long as there is a high level of demand for car ownership, there will be business in car inspections and Vicom is dominant in this regard.

Midfielders

Midfielders need to control the play. They have to create opportunities for offensives, and at times have to roll back to the defensive. For this, I am standing by (6) Boustead, (7) Hour Glass, (8) Kingsmen Creative and (9) SATS.

Boustead is about to break off its property business. For Hour Glass, its founders continue to buy its stock. I view that as positive. Kingsmen Creative has been doing well, expanding regionally and in Greater China. There are many MICE events and theme parks being built in the region. SATS on the end could face some issues with the airline business somewhat affected by negativity with the number of unfortunate air crashes and economic challenges.

Strikers

For the offensive play, I am looking for some excitement, in particular, growth players that may not be as yet high yielding but have the potential to go far. No change to my strikers with (10) Global Logistic Properties (GLP) and (11) Yangzijiang, giving me exposure to China, Japan and Brazil.

The poor outlook of the shipping industry could well affect Yangzijiang. Likewise, the slowdown in China could well see impacts to both. I'm normally averse to holding China plays. But I'm making an exception for Yangzijiang. It however requires some close watching.

Reserves

Nothing has therefore changed after a year to the team composition. But it looks like there could be some challenges in the performance of my first 11 in the year ahead. To mitigate, I've expanded my team by beefing up the bench strength and recruited (12) GK Goh, and (13) Keppel.

GK Goh holds a portfolio of interesting investments (more) with significant insider buying in recent months. Keppel on the other hand is my contrarian play. There is much fear in the market given its lack of new contracts and poor segment outlook in oil and gas. But with a Price-Earning ratio so low, it's too good to ignore given my long term outlook towards my investments.

Play ball! Oh wait, wrong game.

[Disclaimer: I hold all the above stocks. But this is not a recommendation to buy any of these. Do make your own assessment before investing, always. I acquired them at different times over the past five years (post Global Financial Crisis) and have benefited from their growth and reinvestment of dividend payouts since.]

04 December 2014

3 Events in Recent Weeks

Thoughts on 3 events over these past weeks:

1. SGX Crashed. Traders must have moaned and groaned until it was recovered. Pity those software and systems engineers involved in the fiasco. Must have stressed until 'lao sai'. Who benefits? Maybe nobody. Who suffers? Those who trade. But being a value investor, it was a non-event. Fascinating, and marginally amused.

2. Oil Slips. It's been a steep and slippery slope downhill. Beginning to look like Gold. Who benefits? Those who use a lot of oil in the first place. So transportation companies ought to benefit. Yeah for SIA! Who suffers? Those who make money selling oil. Oh no for Chevron. How will it affect Union Pacific? Mixed feelings, given that it is a transportation company but its current business loads seemed to be from moving fuels around. Not doing anything, but watching with interest.

3. The Glass Splits. Not that it's broke, but the shares of The Hour Glass went through a stock split of 3 shares for every 1 share. Effectively, that meant the price also dropped to 1/3, all else unchanged. Interestingly though, there was quite a bit of selling thereafter. Probably some people didn't know what had happened and thought it had crashed. Sounds like an opportunity, so I bought more.

02 September 2014

Hour Glass - Tick Tock and One Becomes Three

Interestingly, Hour Glass is planning to split its shares at a ratio of 3 shares for every 1 share held - see Hour Glass Announcement. All else being unchanged, that would mean that the share price will drop to one third the current price when that takes place. At about $1.80 per share right now, that would make it $0.60 per share thereafter.

While it could possibly make their shares more affordable for trading, I'm not sure that it offers any tangible benefit. $1.80 per share isn't that far out of reach for retail investors. This is unlike those Jardine shares that require tens of thousand dollars. Besides, the new lot size of 100 shares will kick in by Jan 2015. So it's only $180 to own 100 shares.

So what then is the real benefit to split now? I view with some serious concerns, particularly in light of the break-up of the husband and wife team that used to run this company. Their son is running it now. What does the future portend?

23 June 2014

My World Cup Team (of Dividend Value Stocks)

Warren Buffet in several of his talks cited a hypothetical situation for the audience to consider. If you only have a ticket on which you can only punch 10 holes, and each of these holes represent one stock you could invest in, and you can never change your mind thereafter for the rest of your life, what would you choose?

[You can find some of these videos of the talks on YouTube.]

Well, it's the World Cup season right now, so in the spirit of this global event taking place in Brazil, I shall extend that to a fantasy soccer team of 11 first team players. What would my first 11 be for a team of largely dividend-yielding samba stocks?  

I am going with a conservative and defensive oriented 4-4-2 formation.

Goalkeeper

There can only be one goalkeeper. This guy has to ensure that the opponents would not score and is the last man. For this, I would go with (1) OCBC. A big strong and friendly bank to hold the last line.

Defenders

For my defenders, I'm going with the two things that are the cause of  lots of heartburn - property and cars. The main reasons for our high headline inflation. Defensive stocks with high yields.

For property, I'm going with a couple of REITS, namely, (2) Capita Commercial Trust, (3) Capita Retail China Trust and (4) Mapletree Industrial Trust.  So that gives me 3 REITs covering commercial, retail and industrial properties. 

To round off the fourth player, I would go with (5) Vicom, a proxy play for car ownership.

Midfielders

Midfielders need to control the play. They have to create opportunities for offensives, and at times have to roll back to the defensive. For this, I would go with (6) Boustead, (7) Hour Glass, (8) Kingsmen Creative and (9) SATS.

Strikers

For the offensive play, I am looking for potential value-growth players that may not be as yet high yielding but have the potential to go far. For this, I pick (10) Global Logistic Properties and (11) Yangzijiang. Exposure to China, Japan and interestingly Brazil. 


It's pretty much a 80-20 rule. So that rounds up my first 11. What's yours?

[Disclaimer: I hold all the above stocks. But this is not a recommendation to buy any of these. Do make your own assessment before investing, always.]

31 January 2013

Dividend Growth Stocks

For the past few years, I've been taking the approach of looking for value stocks on SGX with good dividend yield.  The strategy seems to have worked well so far.  Of late, I started examining the dividend growth history of various stocks and it seems that there are a few that stand out significantly:

- The Hour Glass
- VICOM

Interestingly, their dividend payouts in absolute dollars have been consistently rising (dividend per share), supported by increasing earnings (earnings per share).  I view with some optimism that Breadtalk may in time fall into this class as well.

Examining the NYSE, there seem to be even more options.  These include:

- McDonalds
- Yum!  (KFC)
- Coca Cola
- PepsiCo
- Johnson & Johnson [EPS is less consistent]
- Clorox
- Kimberly-Clark

These are all familiar brands with significant global presence.  All appear to have been growing steadily over many years.  Fastfood, drinks and toiletries -   essentials in both good times and bad?


Looks like good stocks to hold onto for a lifetime of consistent and growing dividend payout?  Sounds like a plan!

24 December 2011

Recollections of 'my' companies

It's the eve of X'mas 2011, and it's a good a time as any to take stock of events in the year that relates to companies I've taken a stake in.  It's been a horrible and unforgiving year - tsunami in Japan, massive floods in Thailand and Australia, financial crisis Part II in Europe, SMRT coming out like a disaster movie, repeated floods at various parts of Singapore, and the bird flu apparently making a come back in Hong Kong.

Adampak had one of its factory underwater in Thailand when the floods hit. 

Qian Hu is still fishing around and doing poorly this year after the European market tanked.  Fishy.

SPH failed to deliver my papers on a few occasions.  Not getting their basic service done is a bad sign.  And the long time Chairman of SPH has become the President of the Republic.

In contrast, SingPost has consistently delivered my posts.  But the amount of junk mails these days is simply amazing!  But if it keeps the postman busy, it's good?

Singtel phone bills continue to increase throughout the year as the number of handphones I owned have gone up.  How many handphones does one need?  I am still not subscribing to any M1 services.  What will LTE technology bring to their businesses?  More data traffic is the way to go, ever since the rise of the iPhone and iPad.  Long live Steve Jobs!

Still haven't bought anything from Aussino.  I think I'm still happy with my bedsheets.  The trouble is that these things can last quite a while.  I'm not hopeful about their business.

HourGlass appears to be doing decent business.  Lots of tourists visiting Singapore these days and hopefully there're there in the branded class that the newly rich patronise.

SMB United is in the midst of a takeover bid.  Remains to be seen what the outcome will be.

Global Logistics Properties has dived in on the Japanese property market in the months following the Japanese tsunami and nuclear disasters.  Looks like some smart moves.  It's going to be sometime before we see these pan out.  China and Japan are all about exports and emergent consumption.  And that means there is a logistics battle to be won.

On the property front, the cooling measures seem to be gradually taking effect.  Amazingly, the E-Condo I'm living in now appears to be going at twice the price I bought, and that was just 5 years ago.  In land scarce Singapore, this is one area where there is no room for abundance, unless technology breakthroughs bring new opportunities.  I'd stay away speculating the home properties given that these will likely continue to attract frequent policy interventions.  This is one unstable "C" among the infamous 5Cs.  But Capita-Commercial Trust and Mapletree Industrial Trust are alternatives in the commercial and industrial sectors (REITS) for a 'stable' income stream.  That's not a bad thing.

Singapore banks have stood the test of the last two rounds of financial crisis in the US and Europe.  OCBC remains healthy and I'm sure their OCC 3.93% NCPS will continue to pay out annually.  How does the future hold for SP Reinsurance and Sing Inv & Finance?  I'm living off their dividends.

Water is the business for Hyflux.  However, I certainly wouldn't hold my breadth on Hyflux itself. It had banked on the rich African market which was unfortunately aborted by the Arab Spring.  Perhaps the opportunity will present itself again.  It has tried to diversify into China and we shall see how that transpires.  But their overall business in water and waste should remain viable and hence Hyflux 6% CPS should remain ok for the steady income stream it produces.  We need to drink, and we certainly have to shit.  One can die from not being able to do either you know.

CSE Global seems to be having trouble making profits out of their software projects.  It didn't help to find their customers caught amidst the rising tide of the Arab Spring as well.

Ah China!  Who knows where things will go from here.  One can certainly see the throngs of newly rich everywhere.  And I mean everywhere.  So perhaps it's healthy to benefit from their retail growth story via Capita Retail China Trust.

Tat Hong's factory near my neighbourhood seems to have either moved, or else all their cranes have been rented.  Bad sign, good sign, depending which way it went. But they're likely benefiting from their business down in Australia.  It's a reconstruction and recovery story after the floods in Australia had receded.

When economic woes abound, and the price of oil climbs to ridiculous levels, airlines businesses are all downhill, including filings for Chapter 11 (US)!  But I believe SIA will recover and will do well again when things pick up.  But one wonders how the new management team is fairing? 

By a similar thread, SATS' future rests on the recovery of the air transportation business.  They have just secured a contract to operate the new Cruise passenger terminal.  That could perhaps help broaden their business to the sea business.  In any case, they continue to have the stable business of providing food for the SAF.  National Service is good for SATS.

Speaking of food, Brands products from CerebosPac is a must have booster for kids preparing for exams.  What a year of exams!  That's a lot of Brands Essence of Chicken.  It also appears to be one of those staple items for hospitalisation gifts as well.  Students and hospitals, it's all about people!

Kian Ann, Innotek, Teck Wah and Meiban Gp?  Waiting for the manufacturing and engineering to recover perhaps.

With Certificate of Entitlements rising to epic proportion, car ownership has become another that has gone beyond-the-line-of-sight "C" for followers of the 5Cs.  But they all need to go for annual inspections, and the number of cars aren't getting any less despite this.  VICOM for next buy?

Merry X'mas!