Best way to accumulate US & HK stk for the long run

Saxo has a very wide range of markets at rather competitive stock rates too (SGX @ 0.12% only!) which is close to what Interactive Brokers has plus they're licensed by MAS. Not many people know they do stocks cos they tend to market their FX and CFDs more. However they've got custodian fee and inactivity fee charges though.

No commission for stock trading? I reckon, only brokerage fee is waived. The clearing and trading fees of SGX, should be remained...

Commission-free stock trading by year-end? Commission-free stock trading by year-end? Commission-free stock trading by year-end?
25 May 2016 09:00
By Chia Yan Min,Economics Correspondent,,Chia Yan Min,Economics Correspondent,,Chia Yan Min,Economics Correspondent

Investors here might soon be able to trade stocks using their phones and without needing to pay any commission.

Hong Kong-based firm 8 Securities is seeking regulatory approval and hopes to launch the service by the end of the year, co-founder and chief executive Mikaal Abdulla told The Straits Times.
...
Source: Straits Times

(25-05-2016, 11:38 AM)CityFarmer Wrote: No commission for stock trading? I reckon, only brokerage fee is waived. The clearing and trading fees of SGX, should be remained...

Commission-free stock trading by year-end? Commission-free stock trading by year-end? Commission-free stock trading by year-end?
25 May 2016 09:00
By Chia Yan Min,Economics Correspondent,,Chia Yan Min,Economics Correspondent,,Chia Yan Min,Economics Correspondent

Investors here might soon be able to trade stocks using their phones and without needing to pay any commission.

Hong Kong-based firm 8 Securities is seeking regulatory approval and hopes to launch the service by the end of the year, co-founder and chief executive Mikaal Abdulla told The Straits Times.
...
Source: Straits Times

overall this Internet has really killed many industry - cheap will in the end wreck everybody's rice bowl - 

look at how online shopping has already killed the shopping scene everywhere. What government still promoting Singapore as shopper's paradise? Forget it lah look around man empty malls everywhere who the heck still want to come here to shop when they are already going online to taobao nuts right? If no customer walking who would want to open shop pay rental then how are reits going to pay fat hope dividends? I think sooner or later tourism board will get lay off to save money.

now free brokerage who the heck still want to study all those cmfas modules to become stock broker just to get squeezed when they step in this is going to become another sad state of affair.

(25-05-2016, 06:36 PM)sgd Wrote:

(25-05-2016, 11:38 AM)CityFarmer Wrote: No commission for stock trading? I reckon, only brokerage fee is waived. The clearing and trading fees of SGX, should be remained...

Commission-free stock trading by year-end? Commission-free stock trading by year-end? Commission-free stock trading by year-end?
25 May 2016 09:00
By Chia Yan Min,Economics Correspondent,,Chia Yan Min,Economics Correspondent,,Chia Yan Min,Economics Correspondent

Investors here might soon be able to trade stocks using their phones and without needing to pay any commission.

Hong Kong-based firm 8 Securities is seeking regulatory approval and hopes to launch the service by the end of the year, co-founder and chief executive Mikaal Abdulla told The Straits Times.
...
Source: Straits Times

overall this Internet has really killed many industry - cheap will in the end wreck everybody's rice bowl - 

look at how online shopping has already killed the shopping scene everywhere. What government still promoting Singapore as shopper's paradise? Forget it lah look around man empty malls everywhere who the heck still want to come here to shop when they are already going online to taobao nuts right? If no customer walking who would want to open shop pay rental then how are reits going to pay fat hope dividends? I think sooner or later tourism board will get lay off to save money.

now free brokerage who the heck still want to study all those cmfas modules to become stock broker just to get squeezed when they step in this is going to become another sad state of affair.

Yes, thats true.
Technology has always destroyed industries...... but whenever 1 door closes, another opens.
Many ppl in the infocomm and tech industries would not have such jobs without the internet. Let's not forget other related industries like Uber and Airbnb.
Nobody can stop something that ultimately has a strong market demand, because everyone wants a better life, be it convenience, or lower costs, or more opportunities to sell your goods etc.

As investors, we do have to consider such "disruptors" and their effect on the industry.
Retailers are in deep trouble now, and will likely be so for a long time. Perhaps permanently. By extension, REITS with large exposure to retail will suffer.
This is not something new, and IMHO, this is here to stay.
Retail will not completely disappear, as no matter what people like to go to stores, to touch and feel goods before buying. Also, there are many goods that cannot be realistically purchased online. 
At some stage, the retail sector will stabilise. Some goods that are completely suited for online distribution, may see a complete disappearance from the retail sector.

Overall, the technology certainly has to be seen as a +ve for the general populace, although obviously if you are one of those affected negatively eg. retail owners, investors, brokers, property agents (I saw a website that allows buyers, sellers and renters to completely bypass agents and save on commissions) etc., you'd understandably find this hard to stomach

Value-add service, is the only assurance to survival. Uniqlo is popular, but tailor-made cloths are still available and surviving. The value-add service, has made the extra $ worthy.

I read, the brokers are encouraged to move-up the value-chain, to provide more value-add services.

I'm in the infocomm sector doing turnkey projects in financial and government areas. Infocomm sector are not spared either with introduction of software cloud computing.


I think they should have somehow control it. If technology used to create new jobs or complement existing ones then yes but I see all this is a haste rushing to wire up the place, STB doing one thing IDA doing another. I wonder if they had evaluated the people going to be affected by fallout of such changes. 


Cheap means there's not enough profit to spread around to support payroll to keep people on staff that means somebody's going to get cut or end up getting squeezed, how is that a good thing? Cheap is never ever a good thing, nobody no matter how good you are or what skills you have you can never win against argument of cheap.


Example of cloud In the past a lot of IT departments had budget every 2-4 years buy new equipment like servers netcomms storage systems for refresh they could keep an in-house pool of different IT engineers on payroll to manage these systems. The different vendors and IT companies that provide hosting facilities or supply such equipment could also maintain and hire large pool of field engineers to support these customers. Companies also have things like compliance so need to engage auditors so overall you have new graduates coming into workforce the industry can support a lot of jobs.


But cloud computing have changed everything. With software cloud means you can host virtually. A simple example you can pool together a few cheap hardisk and allocate space within them to build virtual servers 


So IT dept now if they host at cloud provider no need to buy or host their own equipment, minus hosting site. Also minus a few in-house IT engineers on payroll will be much reduced, everything provided by the cloud provider in some cases including IT auditors since IT auditors cannot audit the service providers.


The cloud provider since they providing cheap hosting services they need to buy or parallel import in the cheapest crappiest hardware from china thanks to taobao or aliexpress undercutting the local equipment providers, hire the cheapest overseas IT engineers. they could have a pool of 5-10 engineers but they collectively support several hundreds to thousands of virtual systems for such clients where each of these clients in the past kept their own in-house IT staff.


As a result IT budgets shrink and translate into domino layoffs industry wide so how is that a good thing? For company that save such costs could be a good thing for a short while only bearing in mind shareholders always expect more the next time round.


Government probably cannot control cloud, but if they control or block content access to porn sites they should be able to control overseas internet shopping or block things like free brokerage that harm local industry. 

excuse my rant.

Cloud computing, isn't new, with an old name as SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) for decade, IIRC. The IT dept, was reluctant to move with "legitimate" reasons e.g. security, and reliability. If the current Cloud services, have same "value" as before, I reckon, the IT dept, is able to retain their services. AWS has provided an excellence reliability and security cloud services, with support from major software vendors as a total package. There is no more legitimate reasons to keep in-house ITs, before be replaced, even for MNCs.

excuse my frankness.

(26-05-2016, 11:20 AM)CityFarmer Wrote: Cloud computing, isn't new, with an old name as SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) for decade, IIRC. The IT dept, was reluctant to move with "legitimate" reasons e.g. security, and reliability. If the current Cloud services, have same "value" as before, I reckon, the IT dept, is able to retain their services. AWS has provided an excellence reliability and security cloud services, with support from major software vendors as a total package. There is no more legitimate reasons to keep in-house ITs, before be replaced, even for MNCs.

excuse my frankness.

I not contesting cloud providers as unreliable service rather it's introduction has impacted many jobs obviously the "value" cannot be same otherwise what's the point of having cloud.


1 good physical server is about 10-30k usd or even as high as 100k or more, a typical company IT dept  would progressively over time buy up to maybe 20-30 servers excluding network and storage appliances hire as many as 6-10 people for in-house. 


But that's not all there's job opportunities for equipment provider hosting provider then manufacturing side they also need engineers. All these money invested is huge but actually provide job opportunities for many people.


cloud providers as explained they buy the cheapest "blade" servers using software to pool them together then in it
create virtual servers, clients that use them just need to pay for os licenses windows linux and whatever processor or memory storage they agree to use.


Maybe the cloud provider buy 80 blade servers from china each a few hundred usd that occupy 3-4 computer racks hire a few people sitting remotely in india philppine to manage hundreds of virtual servers for their clients.


what value to our local economy does that provide? to the local economy in india phillippine obviously.


Some datacenters today are so empty you can run around play 4 aside soccer in them.

The cloud computing, has provided a way to achieve the same, with a much lower cost. It is not done, by "cheaper" equipment and staff, but a more efficient process/way to do the job. As far as I know, staffs work in data center, aren't paid lesser, but slightly different skill needed.

(26-05-2016, 03:24 PM)sgd Wrote: 1 good physical server is about 10-30k usd or even as high as 100k or more, a typical company IT dept  would progressively over time buy up to maybe 20-30 servers excluding network and storage appliances hire as many as 6-10 people for in-house. 


But that's not all there's job opportunities for equipment provider hosting provider then manufacturing side they also need engineers. All these money invested is huge but actually provide job opportunities for many people.

Cisco has migrated to cloud-computing, from a network equipment manufacturer. Its financial performance, isn't as bad as we might expected. For those companies, aren't able to change, will be replaced.

http://investor.cisco.com/investor-relat...fault.aspx

(26-05-2016, 03:24 PM)sgd Wrote: cloud providers as explained they buy the cheapest "blade" servers using software to pool them together then in it
create virtual servers, clients that use them just need to pay for os licenses windows linux and whatever processor or memory storage they agree to use.


Maybe the cloud provider buy 80 blade servers from china each a few hundred usd that occupy 3-4 computer racks hire a few people sitting remotely in india philppine to manage hundreds of virtual servers for their clients.


what value to our local economy does that provide? to the local economy in india phillippine obviously.


Some datacenters today are so empty you can run around play 4 aside soccer in them.

"Cheapest" blade? The last time, I used a blade computer, decade ago, costed US$20K+ a piece from Motorola. The value of the blade computer, not only on its computing power, but reliability, with very high MTTF.

 M1's data center costs few tenth of S$ million. It is not a "cheap" investment in Singapore. The rest of data centers in Singapore, should cost similarly.

http://digital.asiaone.com/digital/news/...ting-power

What is the value for Singapore? IDA is pushing hard on the tech. I reckon, IDA has done it, with a good reason.

https://www.ida.gov.sg/Tech-Scene-News/I...ture/Cloud

(sharing few points on the topic)

sorry but I think you don't get it. Let me try again.



1 physical server has size dimension, lets say the smallest standalone server takes up a space of 1U in a single 42U rack so 1 rack can 'cram' 40 servers potentially the argument of heat and ventilation leave it aside.


Well 1 virtual server in cloud has ZERO physical dimension it is virtual. So if you buy 40 servers using software to pool them and create hundreds of virtual servers in them then what is their physical footprint? isn't it much reduced? So if a big company had 300 servers excluding net appliance would need 7.5 racks but now just need 1. 


If anybody think it's exaggeration the latest intel cpu has 72 cores in it can partition powerful virtual 8-cpu servers in them. 


So example M1 datacenter can host 900 racks so potential to host 36000 physical 1U size servers good luck to that man.


I know a small datacenter about half the size of JTC factory floor will cost around 5-7 million about a decade ago and back there wasn't enough datacenter but everybody thought the same so invested now there's oversupply. M1 investment in that datacenter you can decide if it will lose or make money, I think it will lose money and IDA cloud vision is gonna kill them all faster. gone case man


Obviously cisco cloud making money because their customer's want it because they can reduce their cost of equipment ownership that's the whole idea of cloud. if you own physical equipment you have to pay for their hosting and maintainence and upkeep hire people to manage. the whole point of cloud is to farm all that to somebody else and reduce cost. 


Typically the metrics 1 support engineer expected to handle 25-40 physical servers so the example of 300 physical servers would need 7 people  but because of cloud you can virtualize 300 into 40 physical you now only need 1-2 engineer. So isn't that cutting manpower and less people having jobs?


This internet thingy is killing a lot of people. We already veering off topic. 


Coming back to it You want cheap and free lunch like free bokerage they will give it to you, but think about how they will take it from somebody's lunch to give to you.