On... KEN

FIRE – Financial Independence Retire Early. The popularity of the movement is largely due to the efforts of Mr. Money Moustache. Of course, financial independence and early retirement is nothing new, I have (and many before me) been thinking about financial independence ever since I started working more than 10 years ago. I must admit by just thinking and without concrete actions, I am not there yet with this ‘FIRE’ thing. Mr Money Moustache retired at 30, therefore I’m definitely too old to beat that record. It won’t be possible for me to retire at 30 (although I consider myself semi-retired at this point); realistically financial independence in 15 to 20 years’ time would be a viable target. Financial independence and early retirement can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. For me, it would mean paying off our mortgage and to have enough in the nest egg generating passive income. So how much would I need? I would refer to the 25x Rule. Of course, circu...

Starting to invest in the market at 40 seems too late and the bus has departed a long time ago. So why have I never started? Was it because I had never heard of the market? No money to invest? Don't know where to start? All possible reasons. However, none of them close. On the contrary, there was never a lack of opportunity for me to start investing especially during the early days of my career. Conversation with close friends occasionally drifted off to discussion about investing in the stock market and due to my lack of interest, it could sometimes be annoying.   So, if there was no lack of introduction, what was it that kept me out of the game? This go back a long way... to the late eighties (when I was less than 10 years old). At that time, my family members were actually 'investing' in the stock market. I never knew how my family members did in their venture, but I don’t recall them being too successful. If they had been, I would have known. What I do know though...

This is my first post ever and I’m pumped. At a late age of 39 (not that late if you agree with the adage that life starts at 40), I decided to start investing in the stock market and write a blog to go with it.   Why now and not 20 years earlier? As most would know, Warren Buffett started investing at the age of ten/eleven. So, it looks like I’m thirty years late to the party. I would like to cover the ‘why’ in another post but for now as this is my first post, I would like to cover the ‘what’. This blog will mostly be about investing and financial planning, with occasional random rants. I intend to post 1 blog every month. I intend to post the companies/stocks of interest monthly. I intend to post my Rate of Return annually and possibly a Quarterly update of the companies I invested in. So, I guess the question is – with so many stock and financial planning blogs online, will another one be of additional value to anyone?   It might, and it might not, but I feel...