My First Financial Read

I finished this book within 2 days! 

Mainly because it's a very short book; not because I suddenly gain the ability of speed-reading.

But what makes this book special, is because I believed this is my first book on financial knowledge.

Previously, most of my financial knowledge and wisdom (however limited it is), is learned from the web from various sources.

To introduce the book first... 

by Goh Eng Yeow

This short book gives rather broad but sound advice on financial investment into the market that you can make, e.g. buying ETFs such as the STI ETF. It cites quite a bit of knowledge from the famous Warren Buffett, and describes the potential pitfalls in the market, as well as when you should 'make your own'.

Note to self: Not sure whether it's in the book, but take note for SPDR STI ETF (ES3) and Nikko AM STI ETF (G3B).

Some pointers to take note of from the book that I like to archive in this post:

• Time and Health is more important than Wealth
• Buy experiences, instead of materials
• Lucky people try hard to add variety to their lives; to create more "chance opportunities" for themselves to get lucky
• Financial Independence is working a financial plan, keeping to it, and sufficiently covering oneself medically
• Buy and hold stocks that one believe will last, instead of stocks that will have a temporary boost
• Observe the daily happenings to understand what industry/sectors are thriving, and will continue to thrive in future
• Low-beta stocks (stocks less sensitive to market movements) are good for long-term investment
• Look for under-valued stocks when the market is not good 
• Be fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful
• Fund flows are indicative of market trends
• Cash is king in uncertain times; the opportunity to snap up assets on the cheap when others do not have the mean to do so
• Avoid overtrading, following the crowd, momentum investing, noise trading, and selling the winners and keeping the losers
• One strategy is to top-slice successful investment - sell enough shares to take back capital and some profit, but still have some shares left to make potential further gains

That's it.

I think I need to buy a new book. 

Another book for the year~!

When one puts in effort and stay committed to a certain task, there is really a lot that one can achieve.
I may not be doing so well in the learning aspect of my life in building up app development skills, but I have been consistently reading up on nonfictional books.

Here's the latest one that I have finished!

by Tim Harford

As per the title suggests, it lets the reader understands about how the principles of economics play out in the things around us. It allows me to appreciate more on the effects that one party has on the entire system which are inter-connected, within and between industries and countries. The world is a complex one, but the theories of economics can help us to understand this complexity a bit better to foretell the consequences or benefits of certain course of actions.

It emphasizes greatly that the world works best in a free trade market as it allows humans to freely communicate and convey information which will work out in a win-win situation. Yet, there are certain restrictions that have to be in place that prohibit a completely free trade situation.

The book also helps me to understand a bit on why Mao's idealistic country didn't come through, and how Deng managed to push China's economy (and probably save millions of people from starving) into greater heights. I'm sure Dearest would appreciate that I have some knowledge of China's history, because she's so passionate about them. haha...

3rd book of the year

It took me a while to finish this book.
I probably bought this many years ago (maybe a decade?), but only managed to get into the habit of reading this consistently over the past 3 months after my second book.

The book teaches me to think more critically on the use of statistical methods on areas where single 'Black Swan' event could overshadow the long history of past events in terms of its impact. Like the financial crisis back in 2008 that the book kept bringing up.
I felt it was quite critical on the statistics that are being used now, and I felt it more because I'm a practitioner of this tool that he felt was bullshit (not in all areas, just those areas with the swans).

Most of the time I found it hard to understand and remember some of the terms that he used. Sometimes it gets rather technical. But overall, it was an okay read to ponder over the negative effects of the black swan and how to protect, or be robust against it, and also think about how to optimize with positive black swan.

Haven't been blogging much nowadays.
Kinda lost the momentum from the early stage of the year due to work.
And also, have been giving less (actually zero) focus on developing my Java skills.
The self-learning process is rather tedious and felt somewhat like wandering around in a haystack sometimes.
I am planning to get started on a Udemy course on Mobile App development to get my engine started again, and specifically in the area that I wanted. The purpose of learning Java was to help in my learning in app development, but since this course also teaches beginner in Java, I suppose it would be more ideal to dive right into this course than to continue on my self-learning, and unguided (except by the textbook) journey.

Wondering what's the next book to read on the train... hmm...

Best line from the book:

"Missing the train is only painful if you run after it."

Another small accomplishment

because of work, for the past 2 - 3 weeks I didn't work on my Java learning skills to allow me to rest while I was travelling on train. So I took up reading as a habit, and within a week, I finished another book!

This time, it was "David and Goliath" by Malcolm Gladwell.

The main gist of the book was to ask people to critically assess whether an obvious advantage or disadvantage, is really what it is thought to be.

Small accomplishment!

I just finished reading the following book~!

But what's the big deal with finishing a book?
Isn't there a lot of people who reads book?

Well, for me, it's a tough habit to keep at.
Reading usually makes me fall asleep faster than anything.
It's a surprise I managed to go through hundreds of pages of psychology textbooks by riding on my adrenaline.

So, first book completed ever since I started this blog!
Small celebration. Yeah!

This book was meant to give me insights on how to focus in my everyday life.
But instead, I got more from it.
It talks attention in the psychological and biological aspects, about being mindful, what does a leader needs, about looking at the bigger picture such as global and futuristic issues.
I'm not so good in giving a book review, but it's not bad.