1Q 2026 Investment Strategy Update

Dear President Trump, you have done it again. You have said to want to negotiate deals with countries to end a tariff standoff that is acceptable to both parties. Yet, the moment U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the tariff measures you invoked under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act were illegal, you raised the tariff to 15% under another another alternate regulation: Section 122 of the Trade Act for the next 150 days. All previous agreed deals are now void.

Dear President Trump, you have said you wanted peace (I know you wanted the Nobel Peace Prize very badly for reasons that only you knew) and have negotiated or participated in some ways to end XX number of conflicts. Yet, you turn around and kidnap the Venezuela president and started bombing Iran because they pose national security concerns to the USA? In the span of 1 week, oil price has increase from $70 to $108, a whopping 50%, directly impacting our common folks cost of living. What about the Ukraine war that is still on-going into its 4th year? Should you not focus on ending this first? Or maybe President Putin is your very good friend and you do not want to displeasure him?

I gathered: I cannot trust you with any deals that we spent countless time negotiating, for you will not hesitate to tear it to shreds in the blink of an eye if things doesn't go your way.

Anyway, chaos, chaos and more chaos. That basically sums up the first 3 months of 2026. Large swings in equity values. With that said, I still believe if the fundamental of the company remains strong, we should double down on cost dollar averaging when its price becomes attractive.

DJI ended at 46341, an decrease of 1722 points (-3.58%) compared to 4Q 2025. For Singapore, STI outperformed and ended at 4885, an increase of 239 points (+5.14%) compared to last quarter. Banks in Singapore (48.7% STI weightage) continues to drive the STI direction. Due to potential rise in inflation as a result of oil price increase (depends on how long the Iran war might drag on), market is pricing that there might be no more interest rate cuts this year.

Below is a summary of my transaction in the last quarter:

Transaction 1: Bought 1 batch Singtel shares in February. Singtel is currently undergoing transformation to embark on the next pillar of growth: Data Centers. Besides developing and managing its own data centers, it just also announced a joint acquisition with KKR for ST Telemedia Global Data Centres (STT GDC) for S$6.6 billion. With stable dividend returning due to its associates contribution, this is a valued company to buy into, with a forecast dividend yield of 3.5%.

That is all for now. See you all in Q2 2026 update and thank you for reading thus far.

What an Amazing Plan (Resolving Internet Down Issue)

Prompted to jot down this testimony for His amazing plan. I am truly amazed at how everything just came together at the right place and time. It all began 3 weeks ago where I have absolutely no idea why certain things happened.

Testimony Sharing

It all started on 04-Feb when a Singtel Agent called me for my broadband renewal. Everything went smoothly and I signed up to renew and upgrade my existing plan for another 2 years. As part of the service to upgrade from 1Gbps to 3Gbps, I needed to change my 7 years old ONR, which no longer support any speed above 1Gbps. And as part of the equipment renewal, I also signed up to replace my 4 years old router mesh system. Installation date was originally set at 11-Mar, which I changed the next day to 18-Mar due to clash with my business travel. A few days later, I found out Singtel secretly (no call was made) changed the installation date to 23-Feb backend without informing me. I found it strange but did no further action as I will be WFH to attend to the Singtel engineer.

Fast forward to 22-Feb. Woke up on a Sun morning to find out that my whole house Internet is down. Reboot the whole systems 3 times and the router still is unable to connect to Internet. Called Singtel CS which ran some test and suspect it could be the physical router issue and recommended to arrange an engineer to come down to my house to check the router.

It then hit me that God, by some miracle, has already made arrangement to change my router on 23-Feb 2 weeks ago. How amazing His plan is that everything just fall into place at the right time! Thank God for your grace and miracle once again!

4Q 2025 Investment Strategy Update

2025 is really not the year for the faint hearted. We have a USA president that is weaponizing tariffs to change world order to prevent the rise of China and forcing company to shift manufacturing back to USA. Whether it is effective or not still remains to be seen, but cost is rising in USA as these tariffs are pass on to customers. We also have 3 regional military conflicts happening within a single year, from "Thailand - Cambodia conflict" to "Israel - Gaza Hamas war" to "Russia - Ukraine war" which is still on-going after 3 years, it is really beyond words that stock market can continue to rise and break their respective top records. In USA this year, we have the AI related industry leading the way, while back in Singapore, we have our 3 top banks to thank for as investor flock to these safe heaven equity.

DJI ended at 48063, an increase of 1666 points (+3.59%) compared to 3Q 2025. For Singapore, STI ended at 4646, an increase of 346 points (+8.04%) compared to last quarter. Banks in Singapore (50.5% STI weightage) continues to drive the STI direction and for once, STI has outperform DJI significantly.

With 2024 drawing to a close, it is time for the annual review against my 3 year plan (Next 3 years (2023 - 2025) Investment Plan) set back in Nov 2022. Below are my result:

Original 2023-2025 plan:

1. 50% Equity, 50% Reits/Trusts
2. Portfolio Dividend Yield to be 3.80% in 2023, 4.30% in 2024, 4.80% in 2025.

End 2025 result:

1. 49.56% Equity, 50.44% Reits/Trusts
2. 78.29% SG Equity, 21.71% USA Equity

Portfolio Yield at 3.73% in 2025 (+0.27% from 2024, and miss 2025 4.80% target)

Verdict: Miss Target

Note: In 2025, Prime US Reit only gave out dividend at a reduced rate (50%). Keppel Pacific Oak US Reit elected to suspend dividend until 2H2025.

Below is my end 2025 portfolio snapshot:

Total dividend received in 2025: $7,758.09 (~$646.50/month)

In this quarter, I did a few buy-ins for REITS that I felt is currently undervalued, so as to position myself for the recovery in the next 2 years.

Transaction 1: Bought 1 batch Prime US REIT shares in December.

The USA real estate has began to recover as tenants started expanding for more office space to accommodate more employees returning back to office. All these will be positive for USA REITs as their occupancy rate rises. Not to mention, Prime has started to increase the dividend rate from 10% to 50%

Transaction 2: Bought 1 batch DBS shares in December.

Our darling for the year as a series of strong results cause the share price to rise from $43+ in January to $56+ (+30%) in December. Who knows if this continues on, we may see a $100 DBS in the next 3 years.

Transaction 3: Bought 1 batch IREIT Global shares in December.

Berlin Campus is currently in the process to change from a single-let property to a multi-let, mixed-used property. Target to finish in 2027, it should directly result in a dividend increase. Time to buy in first for positioning while the price is low.

Transaction 4: Sold 1 batch Marriott shares in December.

I just think it is time to cash in while the price is high and use the proceed to buy in Visa as it is a more stable equity whose price will rise with time due to their share buy-back program.

Transaction 5: Bought 1 batch Visa shares in December.

For stability in slow price appreciation due to their share buyback program and improvement in business year after year.

That is all for now. See you all in Q1 2026 update and thank you for reading thus far.

Next 3 years (2026 - 2028) Investment Plan

I believe "Chaos" is an appropriate term to define 2025. With Trump tariffs re-ordering world's trade, regional wars erupting in parts of the world (See Thailand - Cambodia conflict; Israel - Gaza Hamas war; Russia - Ukraine war which is still on-going after 3 years), it is really amazing that stock market can still rise and break their respective top records.

Looking back the last 3 years, I am glad that my passive income dividend portfolio is still going strong. This year, I am expecting the dividend yield should be around 3.6% to 3.8% range, pending the finalization of some small tweaks I have done the last few days. The dividend yield could be higher, if my current USA reits have started giving their dividend, which they are planning to in 2026. 

For the next 3 year, my target will be similar as the current (2023 - 2025) Plan cycle, with a slight tweak to aim for higher dividend yield:

1. 50% Equity, 50% Reits/Trusts
2. Portfolio Dividend Yield to be 4.00% in 2026, 4.50% in 2027, 4.80% in 2028.

I will likely to continue load up on US Reits listed on SGX as they are still undervalued at the moment, together with our brightest star (DBS). Who knows, we may see a $100 DBS within the next 3 years.

Japan Day 20 - Shiroi Koibito Park & JR Tower Observatory T38

15 Nov - Time flies and tomorrow will marked the end of our 3 weeks in Japan. For today, only plan was to go visit the Shiroi Koibito Park and catch the sunset at JR Tower Observatory T38. I must say that the breakfast venue of our JR Tower Hotel Nikko Sapporo is simply fantastic. They have the highest breakfast dining location where you literally have an unobstructed view of the sunrise (provided you rise early to queue and get the best seat). 

Watching sunrise while having breakfast

After breakfast, we took a train to JR Hassamu Station and walk to Shiroi Koibito Park.

Passing by Hassamu Nishi Park

Shiroi Koibito Park is a theme park by Ishiya, consisting of a free area with a shop, cafe and restaurant and a paid area with various chocolate-related exhibits and, most interestingly, viewing windows through which visitors can observe their signature Shiroi Koibito cookie production process. There are also paid workshop classes available to create your own cookies if you are interested.

Shiroi Koibito Park entrance

Within the park, it also has an hourly Mechanical Clock Tower show where it consists of a parade of jolly singing and dancing mechanical dolls.

Bus theme seats for a cafe

Catching the sun setting at JR Tower Observatory T38

As the day closes, it is time to pack our luggage to head home tomorrow. We will be transiting Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport. Hopefully, we will have some time to spare for their signature bubble milk tea!

Japan Day 19 - 四季彩の丘, Biei Blue Pond, Shirahige Falls & Farm Tomita

14 Nov - Today is a day trip out to the Furano area. At current time of the year, it is already the off peak season and flowers are past their blooming time, we are expecting much lesser crowd. However, the sky seems to have its own idea and started snowing the moment we entered the mountains. The weather really caught us off guard this year as we are not expecting Japan to have a very short autumn.

At the very least, we experienced our first ever snowfall overseas! And it is a heavy one.

四季彩の丘

When in season, the background will have flowers in full bloom

We are expecting to see an azure pond, but......

the snow has covered the Biei Pond.

Entrance to Shirahige Falls

Shirahige Falls

Shirahige Falls with background bridge

Farm Tomita is also the same situation. All the fields are emptied of flowers during this off season, with the exception of its green house, where you can still catch some lavender in bloom. Its cafe is still open and they serve really good Hokkaido Danshaku Potato Croquette.

Farm Tomita

Lavender in green house

Japan Day 18 - Sapporo Clock Tower and TV Tower

13 Nov - After fond memories of Hakodate last night, we bid goodbye to the city in the morning and took a train to our final destination for this trip - Sapporo. Arriving in the late afternoon, we quickly checked into our hotel (JR Tower Hotel Nikko Sapporo) and left to explore the surrounding before retiring for the night. Not too bad, we managed to have our dinner in between and covered the Sapporo Clock Tower and TV Tower. 

For the Sapporo TV Tower, it is a re-visit after 13 years. Same place, different company, different vibes. 

Sapporo Clock Tower

The Sapporo Clock Tower is a wooden structure of American design developed in the 1870s with assistance from the American government. It is known by many as the symbol of the city and is a main feature of almost all domestic and international tours of Sapporo. The clock after which it is named continues to run and keep time, and the chimes can be heard every hour.

Final touch-ups for the "The Sapporo White Illumination" which runs from Nov 2025 to Mar 2026

Sapporo TV Tower

The Sapporo TV Tower, built in 1957, is a 147.2-metre-high TV tower with an observation deck at a height of 90.38 metres. Remembering that Hokkaido is well known for their milk ice-cream, we went around searching for the ice-cream shop that we patronized 13 years ago, but unfortunately, it was no longer there. As time is limited, we took some photos and return to our hotel to rest in preparation for the full day road trip tomorrow.

Sapporo TV Tower up close