Taking Stock of my Financial Independence 3.0 Journey

I achieved FI (Financial Independence) 2.0 in Jun 2021.

I have been aiming for FI 3.0 since Dec 2021 (see this post: http://financeopti.blogspot.com/2021/12/revisiting-my-fi-fi30.html).

As per usual during this period of the year, now is the time to take stock of my FI 3.0 journey and see how I stand. 

Firstly, a recap of what is FI 3.0. It has a few buffers baked in:

• CPF is not included in the Starting Balance - this is the first buffer
• Withdrawal rate is reduced from 4% to 3% - this is the second buffer
• Certain expenses are assumed to last till perpetuity, even if it may not be the case. An example is childrens' pocket money. 

This is where I am now:

Based on my tracking of daily expenses in 2022, I also made a few adjustments:

• Personal spending is increased from $50 to $100 a month
• Travel spending is increased from $50 to $100 a month
• Eating out spending is increased from $600 to $650 a month
• I have also increased the spending for CNY Ang Bao based on previous experience

With the above considerations, I re-calculated my FI, and found that I will need 1.5 million to achieve FI 3.0. I have 0.62 more months to go to achieve FI 3.0:

I'm excited! Have to be really careful with my spending and money now! It is close!

Dividends for Jan 2023 [Financial Independence]

 Here are my dividends for Jan 2023:

So I collected $2644.74 in dividends for Jan 2023. 

In case you are wondering, some stocks are repeated because I have 2 brokerage accounts. 

Here are my monthly dividends over the last 5 years:

Here are the dividends I collected every year until the current day:

Let me know if anything else you want to know about my dividends?

Onwards!

Robo-Revolution: A head-to-head comparison of the top Roboadvisors

To better understand the differences among the Roboadvisors, I decided to looker deeper at their investment strategies. 

Where available, I attach screenshots of where this information is available in the mobile/web app.

So I use 3 Roboadvisors:

• Endowus - General Wealth Accumulation 80-20
• Syfe Stockpile
• Stashaway General Investing

Equity-Bond Allocation

Endowus - General Wealth Accumulation 80-20

Syfe Stockpile

Stashaway General Investing - It does not have equity-cash breakdown readily available.

Here are the pie charts of the equity-cash breakdown:

Asset Allocations

Endowus - General Wealth Accumulation 80-20

Syfe Stockpile

Stashaway General Investing - this provides the nicest visualization here. 

Here's all the Roboadvisors in one chart:

Interestingly, Syfe Stockpile has more US equities than International equities but it is the other way around for Stashaway. 

Geographical Allocations

Endowus General Wealth Accumulation 80-20

Syfe Stockpile - no readily available info or visualization

Stashway General Investing

Here are the pie charts of the geographical allocation breakdown:

Seems all 3 are concentrated in North America, Asia and Europe, in this order. 

If you are interested to try out these roboadvisors, feel free to use my referral codes below:

Endowus:   HDOJH

Syfe:           SRPSL4GWK

The Importance of Recharging: How Jacinda Ardern's Resignation Aligns with FIRE

Jacinda Ardern, the Prime Minister of New Zealand, recently announced her resignation due to feeling "too worn out" to continue leading the country. Ardern has been in office for six years and has faced a number of challenges during her tenure, including natural disasters, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the country's worst-ever terror attack. Her decision to step down highlights the importance of self-care and taking time to recharge one's batteries, which is a principle that aligns with the FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) movement.

The FIRE movement emphasizes saving and investing a high percentage of one's income in order to achieve financial independence and the ability to retire early. The goal is to reach a point where one's passive income from investments is sufficient to cover their living expenses, allowing them to leave paid employment before the typical retirement age. This is typically achieved through a combination of aggressive saving, low-cost living, and investing in a diversified portfolio of assets such as stocks, bonds, and real estate.

Ardern's decision to step down despite still being relatively young and having a successful career highlights the importance of not just financial independence but also the independence of time. The FIRE movement not only focuses on achieving financial freedom but also on having the freedom to choose how to spend one's time, whether that be traveling, pursuing a passion or simply taking time off to recharge. It's a reminder that even though we might have achieved financial success, it's also important to take care of our well-being and mental health.

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/world/jacinda-ardern-new-zealand-pm-resigns-says-she-will-not-seek-re-election-3216436

https://sg.yahoo.com/news/jacinda-ardern-says-no-burnout-193113787.html

https://news.sky.com/story/burnout-why-jacinda-arderns-rare-admission-about-her-mental-health-matters-12790047

Dividends for Dec 2022 [Financial Independence]

 Here are my dividends for Dec 2022:

So I collected $1926.16 in dividends for Dec 2022. 

In case you are wondering, some stocks are repeated because I have 2 brokerage accounts. 

Here are my monthly dividends over the last 4 years:

Here are the dividends I collected every year until the current day:

Let me know if anything else you want to know about my dividends?

Onwards!

How much do I have in stocks? | Financial Snapshot - Dec 2022

 This is a snapshot of my finances at the end of 2022.

Naturally, I do not want to disclose too many details or my net worth, the amount I have in banks, etc. so I will just share the following:

Not included in the above are bank savings, insurance policies, CPF, SRS, etc. The above is just the amount of stocks and cash in my 3 stock brokerage accounts, the stocks in my BCIP, SRS, and Robo-advisor accounts, and the bonds I am holding at the moment. Since I worked in the US before, I also added my 401K and Wealthfront investments to the above. For completeness, cryptocurrencies are included in the Stocks portfolio (though only a small percentage). 

For 2022 my Stocks portfolio only increased 2.89% YOY, the lowest across all years since I started tracking. For reference, the S&P500 dropped 19.4% in 2022, the worst year since the 2008 financial crisis (https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/stock-market-live-news-updates-december-30-2022-113654551.html). It does not mean my portfolio fared better though because I top up stocks into it regularly using dollar-cost averaging strategy. 

Here's a visualization of the Stocks (SGD) and Bonds (SGD) over the years:

Onwards!

Dividends for Nov 2022 [Financial Independence]

Here are my dividends for Nov 2022:

So I collected $1093.75 in dividends for Nov 2022. 

In case you are wondering, some stocks are repeated because I have 2 brokerage accounts. 

Here are my monthly dividends over the last 4 years:

Here are the dividends I collected every year until the current day: