Sunday 14 October 2012

Screaming buy, 12 months later...


Approximately 1 year ago, I wrote an article, saying two markets were screaming buys if investors could hold for a year.

The date was 22 November 2011; the call was 22 November was an attractive entry point for Singapore and Hong Kong, and in Asia ex Japan equity markets. I’d like to say I did deep economic analysis of the markets, but it was based mostly on valuations.

Since 22 November, all three markets have shown 10%+ returns.

 The Hang Seng Index, representing the Hong Kong market, is up 15.81%, in HKD terms. Meanwhile, closer to home, the STI is known to be the boring sister to the HSI…
Image credit: http://finance.yahoo.com
…but that didn’t stop her from putting in 11.9% returns since 22 Nov 2011 in SGD terms.
Image credit: http://finance.yahoo.com
In USD terms, the MSCI Asia ex Japan (represented by its iShares ETF) returned 13.3%.
Image credit: http://finance.yahoo.com
Like I mentioned, there wasn't a whole lot of intelligence behind this decision – it’s essentially a look at valuations, which, at the time, were way low. Maybe it’s blind luck, but it’s always nice to know I’m right. This time anyway.