How about both? When you invest in robo-advisors e.g. Smartly, you are investing in US ETF too. So it depends on the market exposure you are looking at. For smartly it's converted to sgd on the site when you view it. There is also a currency impact portion where you can view it too. It changes everyday so when you feel that it's time to cash out, you can do so.

I don't work at any of the roboadvisors/digital wealth management platforms but have attended enough meetups where the StashAway or Endowus teams answer these questions when people ask. It's usually confidential and something they can't disclose because it's private business information that could be sensitive for their clients and also poses competitor analysis risk.

Hi Anonymous, it's Chuin Ting from MoneyOwl. Thank you for your question. We start first from our investment philosophy - what would give our clients the best chance of meeting their financial goals - and then look for funds and instruments that best fit this philosophy. We also take into account what is suitable for the ordinary, Singapore-based investor. We looked at about 4-5 fund managers' products before landing on Dimensional. Our investment philosophy has the following main tenets: 1. Broad diversification - because we believe that asset allocation explains the bulk of the variability in returns, we go for globally and sectorally diversified funds that provided the broadest market exposure to "make up" or fulfil our asset allocation-based portfolios. In this way, we do not take country/market, sector, or company-specific risks. For equities, this means global equities (both developed markets and emerging markets). For bonds, we go for global bonds (but hedged back to SGD - explained below). Dimensional funds we have chosen for equities have 7,500 securities in the Core Equity fund, 900 securities in the Emerging Markets Large Cap fund and 200 securities in the Global Short Fixed Income fund. 2. Market-based return, not "active" management based on forecasts or individual manager skill - we believe that markets are efficient, and the track record of active fund managers has been very poor. We believe in harnessing the collective wisdom of markets. In both the short and long terms, only a minority of active managers outperform their benchmarks - and this is observed across developed markets equities, emerging markets equities and bond markets. Furthermore, the persistency of good performing managers is low - in other words, even if you managed to select one manager in that minority that outperforms in year 1, by year 5 in all likelihood he is no longer top performing. Thus, we choose funds that do not do such active management such as tactical asset allocation shifts based on reading of macro data or forecasts, or stock picking based on forecasting sector rotation or company earnings. 2 types of funds can fulfil this "market-based" criterion. One is passive funds, but there are no globally diversfied passive indexed funds available for retail clients in Singapore. (On why we did not choose ETFs, please see below.) Two is "evidence-based" funds, namely, Dimensional funds. In its funds, Dimensional takes a broad market exposure and tilts them towards “dimensions” or factors that have been documented over time and with evidence of higher projected return over the long term. For equities, for example, these tilts are towards value, small size and profitability. The observation of these dimensions are based on leading academic research, including that by Nobel laureate Eugene Fama and his colleague Ken French (Fama being the progenitor of the Efficient Market Hypothesis in 1966). Note that market efficiency does not mean that all assets have the same expected return. As a side comment, this trust in markets rather than in individual manager skill is evinced in the corporate culture of Dimensional and its principals. On a corporate level, to keep costs low, they do no advertising, never pay any commissions, moved their HQ to Austin, Texas. Over the past years when my colleagues and I met with Dimensional folks, we were struck by how humble and down-to-earth they are. By their own admission, they are rather "boring". But perhaps the meek do inherit the earth: Over a 15-year period from 2003-2017, 73% of Dimensional's equity and fixed income funds outperformed their prospectuses' benchmarks, while in contrast only 14% of equity and fixed income funds that were around at the start of 2003 beat their Morningstar category index. 3. Low costs - kudos to all the companies in this event on this count, which are choosing low-cost funds which pay no trailer commissions (which often account for up to half of funds' high expense ratios) because this affects the return of investors. However, low-cost by itself is insufficient for a fund to be selected by MoneyOwl, as there are funds which have low expense ratios but market-time through allocation shifts in response to macro or market data. 4. Suitable for small investors in Singapore - this set of considerations lead us to prefer SGD-denominated unit trusts rather than ETFs: a. As an NTUC social enterprise, MoneyOwl seeks to serve the ordinary investors and we particularly encourage regular savings plans (RSP) whereby a sum is put towards investments every month. We start our minimums at $100 lump sum/ $50 monthly, so almost everyone can invest! For this reason, while ETFs listed on overseas exchanges were considered, they are not suitable for small investors as the amount invested might not be enough to buy whole shares and investors would end up either with fractional shares, or not be fully invested. MoneyOwl is not comfortable with fractional shares of ETFs as legal ownership is not clear. There is no such problem with unit trusts/ funds. (There are a few additional issues of withholding/estate taxes, bid-ask spreads, forex spreads etc. esp for US-listed ETFs) b. There is no suitable global bond passive ETF that is currency-hedged to Singapore dollars, unlike the Dimensional bond fund which is currency hedged. Bond currency exposure is generally hedged back to base currency because the volatility of currency exceeds that of bonds, and it does not make sense to take this additional risk. Finally, I want to add a point that, while not directly related to why we chose Dimensional, is relevant in MoneyOwl philosophy of how we give clients a successful investing experience. Dimensional funds are unique in that worldwide, they are sold only through advisers. Dimensional believes in "advisor alpha" - that through the work of advisors in helping clients navigate trade-offs and especially to risk-coach clients to stay invested during turbulent times and not market-time by moving in and out and losing out on return. Thus MoneyOwl is more than just an access channel to low-cost or quality investments. Some people have commented that many "roboadvisors" are more robo-fund managers or robo-tools. MoneyOwl has a robo platform through which we deliver some parts of advice, but we also have a team of human advisers - our bionic model - to deliver this "advisor alpha" that Dimensional believes in. Thank you for reading this and I hope it gives you better insight into how MoneyOwl selects funds for our advisory portfolios. I'll be happy to explain more at the event!

HI Zhirong, I didn't have a chance to answer your question at the live question session yesterday night, partly because it gave me pause and actually a little moved -- that you would ask us robo/bionic advisers, coming to market a relatively new business model, about our ideal customer; when surely it is our job to ask you, what you wish to see in your advisor and how we can journey with you in a way that really adds value to your life. For MoneyOwl, our purpose is really getting advice right for the ordinary man in the street so that every family can have a plan for sufficiency in retirement, adequant protection against the things that can destroy this plan, from a holistic viewpoint, and enough buffers for peace of mind and give the stretch to that hard-earned dollar. For some customers, this would mean investing in a way that has little guesswork. For others, it could mean just sorting out or saving through CPF without having to buy any products or even invest with us. Yet for others who need it, just budgeting advice and saving into instruments like the Singapore Savings Bond. Perhaps our perspective is a little different because we are not just doing investing, but comprehensive advice.

To answer your first question, yes your dividends are re-invested back into the portfolio. It will go back into your account and it will be whon in the transaction statement monthly. In fact, I think most robo advisors witholding tax will all apply. If you transfer that amount into your Robo-advisor account (it is basically their bank account) the total amount will be managed by them (usually they will keep a small % as cash) but almost 95% or more will be invested based on your risk preference and appetite. Hope this helps!

Regular investing into smartly/roboadvisor is good. But your idea of withdrawing it to pay insurance premium is not. Investments will fluctuate and by withdrawing the investments at its downturn point would actually hurt the portfolio returns in the long term. If you need the daily savings to pay off insurance premiums, you should put it into a bank deposit or Singapore savings bonds. Just withdraw the singapore savings bonds 1 month before the premium due date.

A robo adviser is alway removing human emotions and helping you to diversify in a low-cost way. I don't see the point of diversifying if your capital or monthly amount is small. You should probably lump into one for easy checks. (Do NOT check daily, investment should be long term, check once or twice per year... easier said than done thouhg) Stick to one. Find the best that suits you and stick to it. Any small disadvantages or advantages that crops out later probably is insignificant.

Dear Anonymous, This is a great question and Endowus has reviewed the pros and cons of accessing various products and we believe that the most efficient way to access certain asset classes or funds is through a third option - Irish UCITS Funds(Unit trusts). I have seen many comparisons but nobody has really delved into the key issues in detail. Because they normally compare the US ETFs vs Irish UCITS ETFs or UCITS ETFs vs UCITS funds. I will review the pros and cons of the respective fund vehicles below; 1. US ETFs on the surface look good as they have lower fees and have narrow bid-ask spreads but this is more than offset by the huge witholding tax that it is subject to (For example, if dividends are 3% then you will be charged 1% which dwarfs any benefits of lower fees/narrow bid ask spreads). Recouping taxes is notoriously difficult as the money is co-mingled (meaning the dollar invested is not in your name and the tax refund is not specific to you) - you only get partial refund and you have to wait a long time after the money has been deducted to get a refund and God forbid you take your money out from the platform before the refund comes through as you may never get it back. 2. Irish UCITS ETFs simply solves the tax issue but on the other hand you have less choice in terms of ETFs, the bid-ask spread is quite wide as liquidity is poor, and finally the fees are higher as they tend to be smaller in scale and scale vs cost is directly and inversely correlated. However, you can bypass the bid-ask spread issue by accessing them through market makers at a small fee at NAV (this is the actual price/value of the fund = and please remember ETFs are funds as well but they are just listed to provide intraday liquidity and readily tradeable. This is a key point I elaborate on later). 3. UCITS Funds. Apart from the fact that these funds are tax-efficient like the UCITS ETFs, they also have no bid-ask spread. NONE AT ALL. This is because you can buy/sell it at the actual NAV. Even US ETFs have bid-ask spreads and some US ETFs are very wide at times. The whole point of ETFs and the reason they have bid-ask spreads is because it is exchange traded. If we trade US or UCITS ETFs from Singapore then we normally trade only once a day so it defeats the whole purpose of using ETFs which is supposed to provide live intraday liquidity. They trade once a day and provide liquidity once a day. So there is no benefit to ETFs other than the other factors focused on cost, which on balance including tax and FX risk, they lose out on. We are not taking advantage of the most important aspect of why ETFs exist. Furthermore, for UCITS funds, because you are buying at NAV at daily liquidity there is no additional cost of transaction and no need to inefficiently fractionalize shares(llike ETFs) as you can invest to the cent at NAV price. Finally, these funds have a broader choice than UCITS ETFs and they tend to be at scale much cheaper in terms of total costs. There is also another important factor that many people don't discuss as much as taxes, and that is the impact of FX on risk and returns. We pursposefully build and access UCITS funds denominated in SGD or Singapore dollar hedged products in the case of fixed income products. Whereas you are taking FX risk with US or other ETFs, which involves additional costs. This is a big additional benefit to accessing the products through Irish UCITS fund structures. So if you combine all of that, UCITS Funds from the likes of PIMCO and Dimensional that Endowus uses, are in fact the most cost-efficient, tax-efficient vehicles and removes completely any FX risk. Thereby allowing you to invest your Singapore dollar savings as a Singapore based investors with peace of mind. Thank you! Yours Sincerely, Sam

Since 2001 when world data was first available. This would have covered many market cycles and crises including the 2001 Dot-Com bubble, 2003 SARS epidemic, 2008 GFC, 2010 Euro Debt Crisis I, 2011 Euro Debt Crisis II, 2015/16 China meltdown. The backtesting is carried out to provide scientific basis for our return & risk projections. That said, we strongly urge you to assess our actual investment returns which are published and updated on our website https://www.autowealth.sg/strategy.php This practice of publishing investment returns is a reflection of our confidence to deliver superior returns and also a reflection of our values to provide transparency. We note that we are the first in the robo-advisory space and the only one to do this.

How about a Robo that invests in value companies? The DFA funds EndowUs and MoneyOwl uses invests in these Dimensions that has proven to generate a higher expected return over a time. Value, small cap, profitable companies.