It has been a long while since I’ve blogged. I have been extremely busy with some other matters. So much so that I did not have the time to post regularly on my personal blog. Well, this post is going to take a much more different tone as compared to my usual posts about property and stocks.
I have been painstakingly building the corporate secretarial and consulting business. It is a few companies dealing with corporate compliance, accounting and tax-related matters as well as consulting work. After toiling for a number of years, I would like to declare that entrepreneurship is not easy. Nor is it for everyone. That being said, the joy of seeing something that you’ve worked on take off in ways that you would least have imagined is something that you can never fathom. Our clientele is a mix of small to mid-sized companies in Singapore and we assist them with their corporate work like the incorporation of entities, tax filings, accounts, annual returns. On the consulting side, we worked with companies to help them to restructure their operations, implement cost-saving methods and even assisted them with structuring some investments. While this may seem rather remote when compared to real estate and equities, dealing with corporate structures in Singapore has made me realise that Singapore is an extremely business-friendly country. We have comparatively low corporate taxes, extremely business-friendly practices and we are generally welcoming to foreign investment. Of course, the pandemic has caused an outflow of foreign talent due to the restrictions that are imposed on the movement in and out of Singapore but otherwise, Singapore is an extremely business-friendly country. If you are in business, you will be able to sense when foreign investments are moving into Singapore. I can perhaps tell you that I personally experienced companies shifting out of the UK because of Brexit and out of Hong Kong because of its zero COVID stance and moving into Singapore. The next other financial centre of notable significance is perhaps Shanghai and I do think that their similarly strong stance towards achieving zero COVID cases will be a push factor for foreign companies that are thinking of entering Shanghai. The viable option is none other than Singapore.
This then brings me to my point that investing is about being as multidisciplinary as you can possibly be. If you are well versed with the property market alone, your data points are typically historical. You tend to make your predictions based on past price movements without really understanding the true reason for the price movements at that point in time. There were spikes in population growth which led to sharp price increases in property prices. However, a myopic viewpoint of such a spike would be to conflate the population spike with “it’s time for property prices to rise because it has been low for so long”. It’s like treating the root cause of the illness rather than treating the symptom. My personal take to those who are looking for that pot of gold would be to take a more expansive view of investing. While the equities market may not be something you are looking to get into, their price movements will be a good barometer as to where property prices are headed. That being said, even cryptocurrencies, which exhibit a strong correlation for the risk appetite of the market, tend to be a good indicator as to how buoyant a market is.
Another reason for my lack of posts would be that I am furthering my studies. I am perhaps at a stage in life where I would like to pursue something more than what I have academically. This is perhaps what has been taking up my free time. That being said, I have acclimatised to the required rigour that is required of me and I should be able to contribute more towards my blog and YouTube channel. I will be adding content from my experience running companies and my business dealings to try to expand what I post on my blog and YouTube channel. The content will be less focused on property and equities and perhaps a little more philosophical when it comes to my posts on business-related matters. This is why I’ve changed the title of my blog from “Daryl’s Investment Blog” to just plainly “Daryl’s Blog” I will remain objective in my reviews and as educational as I can when creating knowledge-based content. As always, if you found my content useful, do subscribe and share my work.
Stay safe everyone and have a great year ahead!
Yours sincerely,
Daryl
