I have about $400k to invest. I would prefer something v safe what should I do?

Etf or robo

Hi anon,

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I don't know what your age is; but depending on where you are in life, you might have to invest for income; if your runway is longer, consider investing for gains if you are still employed and have an active income source. However, you will eventually have to allocate your portfolio's focus back to income, because ultimately, you need income producing assets to survive. So asset allocation is important as well.

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Nowadays, picking up knowledge is quite easy with a couple of hours spent researching, I do caution on believing 100% of what you read because not everything said online is the truth. Also, speak with several advisors to seek various views and opinions. Do not commit to anything first. If anything, the discussions you have will be able to help you pin point what things may suit you, what may not, and hopefully clear up any misconceptions you may have about the various asset classes.

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Next, I'd like to point out that something 'v safe' would mean lower returns, since you want to remove the risk factor. Would that be acceptable to you? For example, with income producing assets, even 3% of $400K is $12K a year which would be a decent amount to take care of a large part of bills and some groceries. If that's not enough, then you can't be investing in safe assets, you have to take on some risk. Robos, ETFs, bonds all carry risk. The only thing you mentioned that is safe are FDs, but even that doesn't yield 1% typically.

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As mentioned in one of the other answers, $400K is your hard earned money, so you have to ensure that you aim for risk management first (i.e. control the risk of the portfolio) instead of aiming for returns. Losing that $400K may not be an option, it may take too long to rebuild.

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Lastly, please look at your financial situation as a whole, including your current age, assets, family situation, CPF, etc. The solutions that you thought possible might turn out to be too risky depending on your actual situation; it's unfortunately not possible to cover every possible permutation in the confines of a written answer. I wish you all the best and you can reach out for tailored advice if needed.

Dbs..if dbs go bust, it means singapore go bust. A good captain goes down with his ship ;)

The safest place to park money and earn decent returns is CPF but take note of the drawbacks as well. Mainly that there is no flexibility when it comes to withdrawal.

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As for high quality bonds, these are typically considered very safe assets as well. however, take note that their returns are extremely low now and the risk comes from not beating inflation. Thus, simply putting everything into bonds means you will slowly but surely lose real value.

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Personally, I would put most of my money in equities. Specifically ETFs for a simple, cost effective and time efficient way of investing my money in equities. Definitely not the safest in the traditional definition, but still one of the best place to park money in the long term.

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I'd probably opt for investing a lump sum followed by dollar cost averaging the remaining sum of money over a year or two.

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I personally dollar cost average into irish domiciled etfs. Check out my article here to find out more about them: https://thedollarsapling.com/2021/09/17/irish-d...

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To learn more about personal finance and investing, check out my website at www.thedollarsapling.com