Value Investing: Jump Start in Singapore

I had no luxury of spare free cash flows. Some of the things that helped:
1. Common Stock and Uncommon profits by Philip A Fisher.
2. Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham.
3. Where are the customers' yachts. Can't remember the author, but the book available from google play.
4. Talking to stock investor friends. Most of my stock investor friends are sane and they do reaffirm many of my doubts and questions.
5. Apply lots of common sense. High PE can be sustainable and also unsustainable, but you have to understand how the business is growing. High PE is not a reason for not buying, if the business growth is sustainable.

Some fundamental principles that I think are very important:
1. You have to understand the business. If you don't understand, its not the right investment for you. Peter Lynch mentioned this in a number of videos.
2. Understand the financials, especially things such as sustainability of profits and whether business will remain viable
3. Price is a function of the business. However high the price is, if the business is not tenable, prices will tumble anyway in due course.
4. Read analyst reports and do your own. At least, it ensures you do the minimum and not do anything less than what analysts are doing.
5. Attend the AGMs at least and query the management. I m surprised that many people don't attend. Its the best time to know whether the guys are the helm are up to the job and continue to do so.
* 6. Not buying or selling can also be a decision well made. Daily buying and selling is not necessarily value investing, though it can be fun.... gambling sometimes.
* 7. Prices fluctuate daily for all kinds of reasons. Be sure you know what you buying, so your heart will not drop when prices start retreating. A price retreat doesn't necessary mean that biz is doing badly and (quite often) its the result of irrational (and rational) investing behaviour of the different market participants.
* 8. Make it a point to write down why you are so convinced about a stock. When you are about to make a buy or sell decision, have a look at what you have previously written and question yourself whether those points remain relevant. Unfortunately, we mere mortals can be extremely "frivolous" and change minds rather quickly. You do not want your "frivolous" self to be making the call and end up with "frivolous" results.
* 9. Both black and white cats also can catch the mouse. Same thing for equity instruments, options, warrants and bonds. But, you have to understand that not all cats offer the same efficiency in catching the mouse. Use the right cat for the job or better still use a pest buster, if you are unsure. The pest buster being a mutual fund with track record.
* 10. Having many counters doesn't mean that you have effectively eliminated risk. In fact, having too many counters end up diluting your rate of return from the good quality stocks, though it also reduces the effect of negative return stocks. Have a few good ones that you understand and thats all that you need.

What would help you even more:
1. Participate in the forums. The intellectual sparring helps to further attest to your hypothesis or otherwise clarify your "blindspots".
2. Make sure you use only funds you can afford to put aside and not see it for a long time to come. 1 month is not long time, unfortunately.
3. Don't sit on your research. If you think a stock is worth looking at, spend time reading about it. The annual report is important. Watching share prices is (interestingly) less important, compared to reading the annual report.
4. Remember you are the biggest enemy to yourself.

PS: 8 June - added some stuff and indicated with *. Those are very pertinent points too.

For new birds, I would suggest you choose a course that you feel comfortable and go for it. it will save your time. Time is critical in value investing.

Reading for sure, you can figure out your own idea by intensive reading, but it takes a lot of time in order to achieve the level of systematic knowledge and draft out execution plan. To be honest, compare with the expected profit, $3000 is really not so much. For most of Singaporeans, it is just giving up a oversea trip this year, which is much more valuable than a trip in long run.

For experienced investor, if you have $3000, good to learn something for others, and get some mental support from the group of people. If you don't have, then some problem with your value investing practice, you have to find a way to fix it quickly.

(09-06-2015, 12:35 AM)Fish Head Wrote: For new birds, I would suggest you choose a course that you feel comfortable and go for it. it will save your time. Time is critical in value investing.

Reading for sure, you can figure out your own idea by intensive reading, but it takes a lot of time in order to achieve the level of systematic knowledge and draft out execution plan. To be honest, compare with the expected profit, $3000 is really not so much. For most of Singaporeans, it is just giving up a oversea trip this year, which is much more valuable than a trip in long run.

For experienced investor, if you have $3000, good to learn something for others, and get some mental support from the group of people. If you don't have, then some problem with your value investing practice, you have to find a way to fix it quickly.

The suggestion is applicable in general for most knowledge-seeking ventures, but might not necessary be applicable for value investing.

Firstly, value-investing is unique. The "knowledge" to get started is minimum, but a right principle is ultimately important. The "knowledge" and "principle" can be easily obtained from a good book. Of course we can chose to get it from good courses, but I really doubt much time can be saved.

Secondly, value-investing is a matching game. It means we need to find a suitable strategy for our temperament, with the base principle remains similar. Do a one-to-many course, able to give a suitable strategy for you? I really doubt so. A practical session with stock market, is the only way to find it. Of course keep reading good books, and articles, might give you hints to reduce the effort.

Lastly, we should learn from others, especially those successfully value investors. Unfortunately, those are usually don't conduct courses. I learned from Warren Buffett from his shareholder letters. I learned from Yeo (from Yeoman Cap) from his interviews. I learned from Howard Marks from his memos, especially his unique Buddhist concept of "mujo" with value investing Of course, I shouldn't miss the VB forum, which allow us to share views/ideas with like-minded buddies.

(sharing a view from one who didn't attend any value investing courses before)

Value investing is a journey and a proven wealth accumulation process.

No short cut. Is a hard work, but can be work smart.

Attending those VI courses may give you a 'head start' but not necessarily equip you all the 'tools' to be a successful investor. As pointed by CF, those wisdom or methodologies can be obtain easily from reputed sources.

Imagine what can you learn from 2-3 days course? They just pump up all the materials to you and you don't have time to digest and learn in depth.

You will be highly motivated after attending the course and feel confident that you will be successful in investing after that. When time passes, and you look back, are you achieving what you wanted? Most will still in a loss.

IMO, the success key is in execution. As said, VI is Simple, not Easy.

Haha, this is my first post. I will give it a shot to answer this question.

Price is what you pay. Value is what you get-Warren Buffett

Remember this quote and think of how much value can u really extract from this short course in terms of the price that u r paying and other viable opportunitIes
To me, reading those books that were mentioned on earlier posts are a good place to start.

Citing an example by using an analogy from the stock market, it is my way of saying why go for 10% returns stock(SHORT COURSE]) while the market is offering u a 10% returns bond(READING GOOD BOOKS) at current yield(Ease of accessing to high quality materials with the help of Google) with a much lower risk characteristic(CHEAPER). Therefore, I really think your money should be put into other areas for better areas.

I hope that u get my point. To me, adhering to a value investing philosophy is like incorporating the principles to my life in all kinds of area, not necessarily only area of investing. Slow and Steady always win the marathon. I believe the process of learning value investing is like a kind of marathon, but not a 100m shuttle run.

Welcome to our VB. I am glad more and more investors are participating in value investing venture. I hope this forum contributed in a very small way to help.

Wish you a very best VB experience

Regards
Moderator

Hi I am new here. I briefly skimmed through the forum and I think there are loads of information here to learn from.
Can try reading this book "little book of value investing" too

(10-07-2015, 01:58 PM)ttlim Wrote: Hi I am new here. I briefly skimmed through the forum and I think there are loads of information here to learn from.
Can try reading this book "little book of value investing" too

Welcome to our VB.

You may want to explore the "interesting books" sub-forum, from our VB member recommendation of worth-reading books.

http://www.valuebuddies.com/forum-11.html

Wish you all the best the VB experience.

Regards
Moderator

(01-06-2015, 11:40 PM)Musicwhiz Wrote: 1) Big Fat Purse - Alvin Chow offers a CNAV strategy to pick stocks based on formulae, screens and filters which essentially automates the stock picking process. His method looks to be based more on Graham/Schloss than Buffett/Munger/Fisher/Lynch.

2) Millionaire Investor Program (8 Investment - listed on ASX) - CEO is Ken Chee and the program has been around since 2010. From what I understand, they are aggressive in marketing and hold many free seminars, as well as advertise at events such as Invest Fair and Invest Carnival. They usually dish out a free ideas at such events and invite people to sign up for the one-day seminar (small sum of $), which then leads on to the 3-day intensive course ($X,XXX).

3) Value Investing College - Headed by Sean Seah and he has a stable of trainers. I haven't really seen them advertising, nor attended the free preview so I cannot comment much.

4) Value Investing Academy - Headed by Cayden Chang. I don't know much about them either though they claim their program is "endorsed by Mary Buffett". Could improve on their English though. Looks more "salesy" than most of the others, going by their website.

5) Adam Khoo Learning - I've heard that AK organizes a value investing type course too but have limited information on it. But I understand AK provides training for a variety of skills (including trading by Conrad Alvin), so value investing may not be his forte.

To those who attended the full (not the free or low-priced intro/sales-pitch seminar) courses above, and you have traded around at least 1 year after finishing the course, and you used fully or partially what they taught you, it will be nice if you post a feedback here on how or if those courses helped you.

It will be best if your mention your % performance (profit %, including appreciation and dividend) for at least a year.

Such courses may open the door for you, but there are many ways to do it alternatively. By reading up books on value investing, practice it and seek good experience investors for advice will go a much longer way.

Value buddies forum and other value forums is another place where you could exchange knowledge from value practitioners.

My 2 cents of input.