Simple Budget, Simple Life

Detailing my yearly CPF top-up here.  This is my 7th year of top-up. However, there will be changes to my CPF top-up strategy d ue to the changes in CPF tax relief . 1. Top-up $3k to Medisave via Paynow As I have hit MA ceiling of $63k in 2021, I will be topping up $3k cash to my MA today to reach the MA ceiling of $66k in 2022. I am doing this today before my Jan 2022 salary comes in, as it will reduce the amount of MA cash-top up and therefore, reduce my tax relief. I've completed my Paynow transaction, which is instantaneous. Look at my CPF MA changes within seconds: Done the same for my husband as well. 2. Top up $5k to SA For the past 6 years, I've been topping up $7k to my and my mum's SA to max the tax relief. That's $84k cash lock-up in my and her CPF. This time round, due to the tax relief capped at $8k for both MA and SA top-up, I will only be topping up $5k to my SA.  However, contrary to the past where I top-up at the start of the year, I have decided to hol

Standard start of year post. My best way of welcoming the new year is to count the new inflow of $ and here's my CPF interest for 2021: Unfortunately, the extra $8,728.48 interest still hasn't allowed me to cross the $700k net worth mark. Will work towards $850k net worth by end of the year :) Have you check your CPF interest yet?

I started prepping this post at the start of Dec. My initial draft indicated that I reached $700k net worth. As the clock strikes 31 Dec 2021, despite my pay coming in, I've not reached this figure.  I probably jinx myself by drafting too early. Back in early Nov, my net-worth was at $690k. I thought I would make it to $700k soon! Alas, my net-worth fell due to lacklustre performance of my stocks and crypto. The only avenue that is growing is my CPF (thanks govt). If I had held cash massively like what I did in the past, maybe I'd have hit $700k net worth soon 😅 Here's a recap over the years: 2016 -  Unexpected review of 2016: hitting $200k in net worth 2017 -  End 2017 review - net worth at $287k 2018 -  End 2018 review - net worth at $372k  2019 -  End 2019 Review - inching close to $500k net worth  (~$440k) 2020 - End 2020 Review - net worth at $550k Targets review: These were what I set out for 2021:  Aim to achieve $650k net worth in 2021✅ Grow my stock portfolio to $

I've earlier shared that I finally set up my SRS with DBS bank and l ater registered for an account with Endowus. These were the rewards I'm expected to receive: 1. DBS Bank - $100 - $50 cash to open SRS with DBS and contribute $10,000 - another $50 cash by investing $10,001 I've not gotten the cash rewards as T&Cs indicated "The Cash Gift will be credited by 28 February 2022" 2. Endowus - $20 - $20 referral credit You can refer to my registration guide here . Earlier, I signed up using someone's link for only $20 referral credit.  Today, Endowus released a limited-time referral bonus of $40 up till 31 Dec 2021 . You can refer to the T&Cs here.   If you wish to withdraw your money from your SRS account at 62 years old, the best time is to sign up for your SRS and make your first contribution by 31 Dec 2021. 22 days left to 2022! Referral If you are keen to embark on Endowus using your  SRS, CPF OA or even cash , you may wish to use my link to  enjoy $

Back in late Aug 2021, I shared about my SGD$100 experiment into CakeDefi . I was lured by the attractive % and also wanted to venture further beyond the usual BTC, ETH buys. 3 weeks later, I provided an update here. Now that it's been 3 months+, here's how my gamble went: Here are my thoughts: The Yay 👍 My entry price was at SGD$3.90. With the price at SGD$6.35 now, coupled with the interest generated + US$30 referral reward earlier, I'm sitting on SGD$470.41 gain The Boos 👎 I don't wish to paint the pic that I'm always sitting on paper gains. DFI coins is VOLATILE - I have not been monitoring this SGD$100 gamble much, but the few times I glanced at the DFI coin, it was a laggard compared to other coins. However, it is interesting that despite the BTC drop of 20% yesterday, DFI coin has held itself well. APY% has been dropping. It started with 88.9% in Aug, to 73.6% in Sep, to 41.9% today. I haven't been monitoring the rate daily but it's great that I s

As someone who held massive cash (in proportion to my networth) previously, it feels scary to see that I'm running out of cash. For context, just 1 year ago back in Aug 2020, I talked about having $300k CASH before reaching 30 and the breakdown is here. Few days after I posted, I came upon Tiger Brokers (see my guide and referral here)  and have invested heavily since. I grew my Tiger Brokers portfolio from $0 to $28k (one month later)  to $70k (five months later)  to $95k (eight months later)  to $136k (eleven months later)  to $170k now (1 year 3 mths later). And unfortunately, I am sitting on paper losses amounting to close to $9,000 now 🙃as a bulk of my portfolio is in HK/China stocks 🙃🙃🙃🙃🙃I'm the donkey. I've depleted more than half of my CASH warchest just on stocks alone. I also started my crypto journey in Feb this year.  From $0 to close to $30k capital pumped. Though the good news is I'm seeing gains of around 20-30%. Not an amazing feat compared to pe

Ever since WFH, I haven't been suffering from Monday blues as much. I guess I only hate Mondays because I need to step into the office. Anyway, happy news to share. Firstly, congrats to those who signed up for crypto.com account when I posted about it (search my blog for crypto.com tags). Back then, I shared about their amazing sign-up promotion where you'd get SGD$100 CRO coins back with SGD$100 deposited.  If you've signed up when I spoked about them in Part 1-Part 4 of my posts, you'd have seen good % increase on your CRO token! Personally, my CRO coins have now > doubled! As of writing, the price has reached ATH. However, because these are staked, I can't cash any profits out, but it feels good to see the price appreciation!😬 Secondly, belated news but I've gotten my Crypto.com Ruby Metal Card! This is actually my 2nd metal card, the first being SCB X card that I signed 2 years back. As of now, I've only used my card for transport to get back 2% cas