On... KEN

I have started a weekly money lesson with my son at the age of 8. Is 8 too young? It might be. Im not sure, but Buffett started investing at the age of 10. I figured, I would give my son about two years to learn the basics about money and should he wish to invest, by the age of 10, he would have the fundamental knowledge to do so. So far, I have covered 6 lessons with him. I will update the blog roughly every time we cross the 5 lessons milestone. It will be a short summary of the topic we covered. Who knows, we might compile it into a book of sorts in the future. Lesson 1 - What is Money? Money has three intrinsic properties. It is a medium of exchange; a unit of account; and a store of Value. We talked about the importance of money in our lives. Lesson 2 - Maslows Hierarchy of Needs. Maslows have a classification of Human Needs. With the most important to the least important in the following order:- 1. Basic Needs ( Food, Water, Shelter ), 2. Psychological Needs ( Intimate relati...

NFTs are cool but Ordinals may be even cooler.  Wait, aren't they the same thing? Very close but not really. There are a lot of overlaps for sure but I mostly treat them a bit differently - At least in my investing strategy. For comparison, my investing strategy for ETH NFTs and SOL NFTs are similar. When I was a young boy, which was many moons ago, I used to collect stamps. Bear in mind, my thesis on stamp collecting is based on my personal logic, not referenced to any study or research on stamp collecting. Stamps are considered a collectible ( at that time at least ), and a used stamp is more valuable than a fresh one that you buy at the post office. There are also special collections that were released from time to time. And those were also considered valuable. When I grew up a bit more, I started collecting comics. Most of them to read and to enjoy the art. But from time to time, I would buy something that I considered rare. I bought issues 1 to 10 of Spawn because my thesis d...

I had wrote that Cash is Trash . But now, I also say that Cash is King. What's going on here? With all things financial, there is always a paradox. And the role of cash is one of them. Forget about what I said about cash being trash and see why I say it is king and you judge for yourself on the Role of Cash. Cash is actually a Call Option without an Expiry. How powerful is that? For those uninitiated, a Call Option is basically a Contract which gives the buyer the rights to buy a Financial Asset at a certain strike price within the contract expiry date. Now, a Call Option without an expiry date - that's Powerful! Let us take an example that I often come across. During the 2008 Financial Crisis, one of the biggest laments of investors was not that their investment had plummeted and crashed. Of course, that hurt a lot. But a savvy investor know that the crash is temporary and when things eventually clear, the price will rebound. However, without enough Liquid Cash on hand, you wi...

Steven Goldstein says that trading is something similar to performance sport. Some people get this and some people don't. I sit in the camp that gets it. When I saw his tweet ( Figure below ), I just thought what a coincidence, I've been having s similar thought myself. I'm not a sports person myself but I do know a little about what a sports person go through. I figured that most athlete would spend 20% ( roughly speaking ) of their time acquiring the skill and the remaining 80% executing on it and training to perfect the existing skill. Take a swimmer for example. They probably spend the first few years of their life learning the skills that is required to become an athlete in their field. After you have learned the different strokes, you are not going to learn anything particularly new. The swimmer will then continue to train every day to perfect the existing skills. They continue to train evey day to execute on what they already know. Why do I think this is similar to t...

Cash is Trash. Everyone knows that, even my mom and mom in-law who are not financially educated knows that. Of course 'Financially Educated' is a very subjective term. In this case, I'm talking about people who doesn't know anything about investing and thinks the best thing you can do with your money is to put your money in the bank ( to be fair, some people know about investing but they think its safer to put your money in the bank - Im not talking about those people ). If my mom in-law thinks Cash is Trash, then why did she keep her money in the bank? Isnt that keeping cash? In my opinion - no. I think money in the bank is not cash. This is just my opinion by the way. I've not done a research on the definition of Cash, etc. And my mom in-law and mom doesn't put al their money in the bank. They actually park a good portion of them in the EPF ( Employee Provident Fund ) - a type of retirement fund in Malaysia. I consider ( rightly or wrongly ) cash as money unde...

On a holiday recently, when I visited my parents back in my hometown, my dad asked me if I know what happened to an ex-schoolmate of mine. I shrugged, having not been in touch for more than fifteen years. He told me - "Word is, he is just loafing around". What a way to put it. I held it in as I wanted to tell him. Guess who else is loafing around? Me. His eldest son. Lmao. I guess its a matter of perspective. It could be due to a different generation but young people these days call it FIRE . Financial Independance, Retire Early. Isn't it interesting, that something that is considered an achievement by young people are taken as a negative by someone such as my dad. Now, Im just assuming that my ex-schoolmate is indeed Financially Independent. I have no clue at all about his financial situation or well being. I'm just guessing that he is doing well and because of his success, h doesn't have to work anymore. In other words, he is happily retired. Retirement turned o...

In my early blog , I've estimated AUD 15,000 per annum as a travelling budget. My recent trip to Japan already surpassed that ( AUD 20,000+ ) and that is only our first vacation this year. I might be the odd one out but travelling is really not my thing. As someone who wants to retire early and achieve financial independance; you can see how just one vacation ( family is probably planning another one or two for 2023 ), has already blown our budget out of proportion. There are many reasons why I dislike travelling. First, and most importantly of course is the budget. Travelling is not cheap. There are definitely cheaper options. But when you can afford, the tendency is to push the limit. That's probably human nature. To me, the money spent does not justify the ends at all. Second reason is that I don't really see the value ( value is subjective ). To be honest, I dont really have something to look forward to with regards to travelling. Some people want to travel to taste new...