I am a retired 52yo novice investor. I am planning to invest in (1) Global equity (S&P ETF Irish domiciled), and (2) Fixed income ETF (eg. bonds). Pls recommend suitable ETFs in these categories?

For equity, I am looking at these ETFs:
(1) Vanguard S&P 500 UCITS ETF (VUSA); (2) SPDR S&P 500 UCITS ETF (SPX5);
(3) iShares Core S&P 500 UCITS ETF (IUSA)
(4) Lion-OCBC Securities Hang Seng TECH ETF (HST/HSS)
Should I spread my investment across all 4?

For bond ETFs, is ICBC CSOP CGB ETF (China government bond ETF) safe for a retiree? Or should I stick to Sg bond ETFs.

Lastly, should I also explore Robo funds, if so please recommend a stable low risk one for a retiree. TQIA!

Discussion (4)

What are your thoughts?

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Samuel Don Oh

01 Dec 2020

Hi there,

The Hang Seng Tech ETF consists of the top 30 tech companies and these tech companies have been largely responsible for the surge of the Hang Seng index so thats is definitely considerable. For Irish domiciled S&P500, you can consider CSPX.

It depends on what's the main aim and strategy of your investment. Are you building your funds over the Long term? Your investment returns are not guaranteed while your retirement needs are. You may want to opt for a more diversified portfolio with more fixed income instruments. You may want to consider annuities as an option too. The above funds are largely equities related So you will be exposed to the systemic risk of the market, ie. no investment is safe.

Overseas bond funds exposes you to foreign currency risk so you may want to opt for a local bond funds but even then, bonds are not doing well now.

You can opt for a diversified portfolio with roboadvisors/financial Advisors that allow you to choose a portfolio that is more concentrated on fixed income.

Financial planning is an integral part of life. You can reach me here to find out more.

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1M45

29 Nov 2020

OPINON:

1) i think cashflow and capital preservation is pirority for retiree compare to capital gain.

2) I would think dividend from SG bank & REITs are more attractive than bond ETF (between 4-6%. p.a). Minimumly the annual dividend must be sufficient for your monthly expenses. Unless you got other source of income?

3) invest in SG banks basically are low risk..... why? Because sg govt wont let the bank go bust. Basically for your dividend portfolio, u can just close eyes, every quarter collect money.

4) with the monthly expenses covered. If got excess $$$ we can invest in some growth stock / etf. Dividend make sure u do not need to sell your investment to support ur expenses.

5) basically u can see (from yahoo finance) the top holding for these US ETF are similar: Appl, msft, googl, amzn, fb.

6) for top holding for china Etf are similar: tencent, baba, meituan, taiwan semicon

7) u can just buy these stock directly base on the weighting of the etf. what is the different if i just buy the ETF?
a) The top holding contributed the most to the etf growth,
b) ETF contain too much stocks , not all are winners, loser drag the etf performance.
c) you will thus outperform the index just buy buying the top holdings.

when i reach 50s i would probably have 70% dividend / 30% growth. (i saying for myself)

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