As a 23 year old civil servant, we receive a fairly stable income with consistent pay increments per year. I have no issues with savings, however I'm having trouble where to invest for returns?

So cool to revisit this just as robo-advisors were being launched. The answer seems so obvious now with a buffet of options!

Take a look at IWDA, it is a global ETF with enough diversification (thousands of stocks worldwide) than our SG local ETF (30 stocks with heavy bank exposure).

Given your stable income, u can go for higher risks in your investments, u can do dollar cost averaging in a equity etf for the long run

Mmm maybe you want to share what's your experience like with investments so far in life? Are you the type who can't sleep at night when you face paper losses, or the type who can take the losses on the chin and move on? May want to find out more about yourself and your personality when it comes to investing before you embark on any major ones.

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Perhaps I'll share some common and uncommon types on investment instruments you can look into

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Common

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Virtually Risk Free

• Singapore Saving Bonds

• Topping up CPF SA

• Government bonds

Backed by our government, no risk here unless there's a sudden change in government and the new one turns things upside down

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Semi risk free

• Fixed deposits

• high interest savings accounts like CIMB FastSaver or Citibank MaxiGain

Only risk here is if the bank becomes bankrupt. Unlikely to happen here though

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Low Risk

• Corporate Bonds

Look for bonds issued by strong companies

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Medium risk to high risk

• robo advisories: risk profile can be adjusted and the portfolio selected by the robo advisory will be tailor made to the former

• stocks / reits: look for good quality reits with strong sponsors like mapletree, or buy into blue chip stocks. Alternatively, can do up a monthly investment plan like the one offered by Maybank Ke that allows you to buy into a selected stock from a list from as low as S$100 per month.

• ETFs: much better than unit trust counterpart i.e. cheaper. Especially if you can access the US market. Can literally employ a couch potato strategy (hands off) with this instrument. Read Millionaire Teacher for some insights on how this can be deployed.

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Uncommon

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Best to to find a mentor to guide you before moving into these instruments. This is so that you can avoid the common mistakes and at the same time know how to best make money

• forex

• futures

• options (personal favourite)

• CFDs

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Good money can be found in these instruments, in the double digit range a year. But you are also likely to get burned with your account if you don't know what you are doing with these.

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Things to avoid (personal opinion)

• unit trusts / mutual funds: expensive fees wise. Fund house earns no matter how well the fund is doing.

• endowments: low returns and funds are locked up for long period of time

These instruments are everywhere. And guess who earns the most? Definitely not you for sure.

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Hope this above helps and all the best. Do let me know if you need more information on any of the above. Cheers