Reading Time: 2 Minutes MrsFrugalSamurai recently asked me how the performance of our stock portfolio is going. “Decent” was my one word reply. Why? She wanted to know. I could have told her it was because one of our holdings has received a significant boost from the early roll-out of the COVID-19 vaccine. Or that another holding has surged off all-time lows from March last year. Even still, another could be the prospect of re-opening international borders, which would allow free travel to commence once more. But. The truth is. I don’t know. More to the point, I don’t think anyone truly knows why markets move up or down. We…
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Regional Markets?
Reading Time: 2 Minutes Hm, recently I’ve been reading more and more about how the regional markets are going to outpace metro locations in terms of capital growth. Stories such as these: “House prices in regional Australia have risen at a higher annual rate than in capital cities for the first time in more than 15 years, as COVID-19 increases people’s desire to live outside the big smoke. That compares to an almost 7 per cent increase for regional markets. “Regional markets haven’t outperformed the capital city markets since 2004,” CoreLogic research director Tim Lawless said.” Are increasingly making people step up and take notice. Yeah fair enough. I can…
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Market Musings
Reading Time: 2 Minutes Howdy all! And a Happy Valentine’s Day. Ooo and hugs and kisses goes out to my personal Valentine aka MrsFrugalSamurai. She made me feel very special indeed with a uniquely composed card and personalized message. Although I could only decipher two thirds of her writing, the love and warmth shone through. Received with thanks MrsFS. As for my present? Well, that’s for her eyes only of course (truly, otherwise Crime Stoppers would be called). But today’s not about love and chocolates and naked bloggers – no, today’s post is a bit of social commentary regarding what I’m seeing in the markets, or rather the market participants.…
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GameStonk
Reading Time: 2 Minutes I have a confession to make. These days, I’ve never made such easy money. I know, I know – what a controversial thing to say The Frugal Samurai! At the risk of sounding like a douchebag, please… hear me out. Mind you, I’m not talking as if I am rollin’ in the Benjamins. Nah. More like a few thou here or a few thou there. You see, in the last couple of months, I have shifted a small allocation of our net wealth into the stock market… or rather into stonks. Now, as a traditional value investor – I had always felt buying stocks was about…
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Wealth Inequality Rises In Australia
Reading Time: 2 Minutes I was perusing through the interwebs as you do, and came across a very insightful article regarding the wealth or rather, the lack of wealth equality here in Oz. It’s a joint research study by the University of New South Wales and the Australian Council of Social Service and to be honest, it’s very confronting. As we know, COVID-19 has exacerbated what was already a burgeoning wealth gap between the haves and have-nots, and this paper only highlights that. Here are some key take-aways: Household Wealth The below compares the wealth holdings of the highest 10% (highest wealth) of households followed by the next 30% (middle…
