ASTRO Q1/24 EPS of 0.30 is under-whelming, the lowest EPS result in last 10 years for Qtr 1. It's dividend of 0.25 is equally under-whelming, the lowest DPS result in last 10 years for Qtr 1 too. It's Q1 revenue is the lowest in last 10 years too.

Given such underwhelming results, will we see the lowest stock price over past 10 years too?
This stock NTA is only 21 sen.

In fact, the 3.2% is against cost. Hapseng is now only 3.1% of my portfolio on Market Value basis. This means, as price falls, my Hapseng falls but because the rest of my portfolio grows slightly, Hapseng already becomes a slightly smaller part of my entire portfolio. All I did was slow down my accumulation when I'm wrong.

If you do the above, then, "Stop buying" is a very powerful tool when we are wrong.

To illustrate. Let say I am wrong at 3.3 entry and price drops 20% to 2.64. My 3.2% shrinks by 20% too to become 2.56% of my portfolio if I "stop buying" and the rest of my portfolio is say flat. It is a good thing if your losses naturally becomes a smaller and smaller part of your portfolio. Go to other businesses and focus to win there.

And mathematically, if the rest of the business wins there, then, your losing 2.56% shrinks even further.

It is a very good thing, when you do nothing to your losses, that they shrink naturally to allow the rest of your portfolio to win.

This is simple maths to ensure winning.

So, how do I measure against dividends? Simple. 2 benchmarks:
1. EPF - let say EPF pays 5%. 5% x RM3 = 15 sen. So, if Hapseng pays me more than 15 sen dividend per year, I win.
2. Fixed Deposits - let say 3%. 3% x RM3 = 9 sen. So, if Hapseng pays less than 15 sen, but still pay me higher than 9 sen, I am okay and can accept this because it's still better than FD.

So, compare against:
DPS 2015 / 16 / 17 / 18 / 19 / 20 / 21 / 22 = 30 / 35 / 35 / 35 / 35 / 25 (Covid) / 35 / 30.
EPS 2015 / 16 / 17 / 18 / 19 / 20 / 21 / 22 / 23Q1 = 42.3 / 43 / 44.2 / 46 / 46.7 / 30.1 (Covid) / 36.2 / 38.2 / 2 (Spooky).

If you treat your (up to 5% portfolio) investment like EPF or FD where you never check on them, what are the odds over the next 5 years that you'll lose out to EPF or FD, when this highly diversified profitable conglomerate business will lose out to EPF or FD?

I think over a 5 to 10 year outlook, the odds it would lose to EPF and FD is minimal. Very, very likely, it'll beat them well.

But never bet the farm or the house, or even the car on this 1 stock - diversify.

However, if there is another Asian Financial Crisis, or a Global Financial Crisis, or another Covid pandemic, market sell of like mad. Then, everything you own crashes including 40+ businesses. Then, if market crashes 20%, your portfolio should lose a bit less than 20% too (or less because it's dividend paying businesses).

But wait out 1-2 years and price bounce back and it's like nothing happened. You keep collecting dividends as these businesses keeps making profits.

To illustrate (for those who are strong in simple mathematics).
My ownership of Hap Seng is 3.2% of my portfolio with an average price of below RM3.3. (let's use 3.3 for simplicity).
Let say I am wrong 20% and Hap Seng falls down to 2.64, around the RM2.6-2.7 support price.
My loss = 20% x 3.2% = 0.6% of capital - I don't lose sleep or even bother to watch the price.
Instead, I focus on its dividends.
And note, it is extremely hard to lose 1% capital.

However, because I own over 40+ diversified businesses, there is maybe 1 or 2 stocks in the past where I stopped buying at lower prices because I was wrong about the future business prospects. They never hurt me more than 1% of my portfolio at the worst so far.

Appreciate there's lot of traders here. I'm not a trader. So, I never cut loss. I also rarely sell. I'm an investor who likes to collect real, profitable, cash generating businesses that pays dividends, and I like to own them at cheaper and cheaper prices. The only time I sell is when price goes up and the dividend yield shrinks and shrinks and shrinks that when it is over-valued, then, I let go. So, lower prices is to accumulate, high enough higher prices is time to start to de-cumulate (i.e. let go very slowly at higher and higher and higher prices). I never cut loss.

Institutional funds cannot afford to buy in a downtrend and show a poor quarterly result.
But the advantage of individual investor is that I never measure my performance on a quarterly basis or even on yearly basis on market prices - it's a folly game. Instead, I measure on how much dividend yield I get.
So, if you have a multi year outlook, on a diversified range of portfolio, you can't help but get a good result if you do things like this.

DPS 2015 / 16 / 17 / 18 / 19 / 20 / 21 / 22 = 30 / 35 / 35 / 35 / 35 / 25 (Covid) / 35 / 30.

Notice how Hapseng lowest ever DPS was 25 sen during 2020 Covid year.

At RM3, 3% dividend yield equate to 9 sen.

Meaning if you buy and treat this like an FD that pays 3%, and present your buy price at lower prices, and not watch your "FD", you will eventually do well just collecting your dividends long term and get a result better than FD. Diversified stocks like this back by a diversified range of business, it is better than FD at this kind of prices.

But never bet a big part of your portfolio - for me, it's worth 5% of my portfolio. A good diversified bet.

EPS 2015 / 16 / 17 / 18 / 19 / 20 / 21 / 22 / 23Q1 = 42.3 / 43 / 44.2 / 46 / 46.7 / 30.1 (Covid) / 36.2 / 38.2 / 2 (Spooky).

Notice how Hapseng EPS was growing steadily from 2015 to 2019 (inclusive), and then crashed in 2020, before recovering in 2022 and then Q1/2023 earnings is a tiny 2 for 1 quarter - so, market is spooked very, very much.

But stop and think for a while. Q1 is historically Hap Seng's slowest quarter. I think a lot of the fears are overblown. With 3 more quarters to go, Hap Seng has decent 50/50 odds of pulling out a market surprise. So much bad news have been priced in, if the bad news is not as bad, this stock is likely to do the reverse sometime this year - that's my guess.

Price should have some reaction around RM3, where for 5 months in 2013-2014, price kept testing around there. This requires patience, 99% of investors don't have the patience to play the long downtrend game and so, when they try to catch a falling knife, they lose. I think it is unclear how price will react at RM3, whether that's going to be support to bounce back, or break through below. If doesn't hold, then, next big one is RM2.6-2.7. If not hold, then, around RM2. I expect to still be accumulating if it falls down to RM2. Trouble is, one never knows if it will break below RM3. It might also never go below RM3. So, much easier to mechanically get something for the long term around RM3+ and then, see and make sure got enough bullets.

From dividend yield perspective, at these sort of prices - RM3 or RM2.6 or RM2, the dividends are super, super, super attractive.

My personal guess is for sure, there will be a dividend cut, because 2023/Q1 EPS is the lowest Q1 EPS over past 8 years and market is spooked how future quarter earnings. HapSeng is a prudent and disciplined dividend payor in the sense that they never pay more than what they earn in dividends, and I like that very much.

Historically, its earnings have been stable and diversified, allowing it to pay nice stable dividends (with small fluctuations). But market now thinks 2023 earnings will be much lower than past 8 years, hence, penalizing the company. I feel Q1 is too early to think so because there's still 3 more quarters to go before year end.

Anyway, for what it's worth, at RM3.08, if Hapseng pays the lowest ever dividend at 25 sen, the DY is already a massive 8%+. 25 sen is the lowest ever dividend paid over past 8 years. If it pays a record low 20 sen, the DY is still 6.7%, super attractive, much better than EPF.

The stock is downtrending, so, I picked up some more today at 3.08, bringing my total holdings to 3.2% of my total portfolio. Still no where near 5% target allocation. Expect there will be more lower prices to come and if the drop is big, then, will add more at lower prices. Nice that it's now below NTA.

One of the benefits of not watching the market closely is you can sit tight and do nothing and like today, pleasantly pleased that BIMB is now 1.93 i.e. all past purchases are now profitable. Technically, still long term downtrend, and such downtrend should not reverse so quickly (normally). Anyway, still nothing to do, no point riding the emotional roller-coaster, our plan was multi-year holding, but if it rises too fast (e.g. bigger than a few years dividends), we will start cashing out to put our funds elsewhere with higher dividends. But so far, even at 1.93, the conservative dividend beats EPF hands down, hence, nothing to do but just get on with our lives.

https://www.thestar.com.my/metro/metro-news/2023/05/26/next-attraction-shaping-up-in-genting?dicbo=v2-v5Mp7qo

Strong close 1.27. Intraday price action like GENTING strong close.

Wow!! I got GENTING at 4.16 and 4.12 and thought I had more time to get more!! 4.35 is very unexpected!

As I am still in the middle of accumulation phase, sorry to say I still welcome lower prices.

If you don’t make a big mistake then as you move to other stocks, they should win more than your losses and overall you win.

Skyu, in your case, at 4.6, best to give the stock time like 1-2 years to recover. Patience. For me, I set a limit like 5% portfolio and once hit that limit, I just ignore market price and move on to other stocks. If the stock falls another 20%, that 5% becomes 4% and I use another 1% to buy again to average down but keeping that portion to always stay below 5%. We can never pick bottom successfully. But you don’t want your mistakes to be a big part of your portfolio. Time and patience. Meanwhile ground yourself on business fundamentals. Welcome lower prices. You are not measured on tomorrows price but when you finally exit one day. We just don’t know when that day will be or what price.

Added 0.3% of portfolio at 3.22 this morning. Waiting for lower prices to keep adding more until I hit say 3%-4% of portfolio :-). This is just nibbling to satisfy urge to own at lower prices.

Today is rest day. Next week price action is critical. If it's true, next week should go higher. If fake news, next week will fall. Best do nothing and just queue to sell some at higher prices. Market decides whether real or fake news.

The risk of this trade is if you don't have 5 year holding power, or impatient. Then, instead of winning this trade, you might even lose if you cut loss too soon or panic.

If one is patient and willing to hold for 5 years, I like the odds of this trade to own at say RM4.10. COVID Low was 2.91. Risk = 1.19. Reward over next 5 years - not impossible to hit 6.5, noting all time high was nearly RM12. Conservative Reward = 2.40. The Reward-to-risk ratio (RRR) is 2.4 / 1.19 = 2. If it makes all time high (less likely in next 5 years), the RRR is even much, much better. The stock NTA is 8.25, i.e. if the stock were to trade back at its NTA over next 5 years (also quite possible), Reward = 8.25 - 4.1 = 4.15 / 1.2 risk = 3.5 times which is very, very nice. This is a good trade over next 5 years.

GENTING's earnings, whilst concentrated on Leisure and Hospitality segment (contributing 87% of total earnings), is actually quite diversified geographically. Out of the 87%, only 30% came from Malaysia. 35% came from Singapore, 19% from US, i.e. majority of earnings are overseas. If price is coming down due to fears of State Elections, then, this fears are less founded due to only 30% of earnings from Malaysia. If worried about weak RM, then, may not be so clearcut.

If you own this counter, make sure you sell on its way up at higher prices. You won't regret because inevitably, its price will come crashing down.

BPLANT is historically well known for its land banks. According to this old analysis, since listing, BPLANT earnings came entirely and more from its sale of landbanks, than from plantation - https://focusmalaysia.my/boustead-plantation-is-the-company-really-in-the-plantation-biz/. Anytime there's news that someone is going to unlock its landbanks, price starts to shoot up. This is a clear goreng stock.

prudentinvestor, not sure what they refer to. The topic is plantation, which both owns, although in the narrative, they specifically refer to HSPLANT, suggesting the latter, although both applies. Still it is wierd to give a Buy/Sell recommendation on HAPSENG based only on plantation, as Plantation is only 10% of HAPSENG revenues, whereas Plantation is 100% of HSPLANT revenues. The way I read is Kenanga refers to HSPLANT, because 90% of HAPSENG revenues come from Property, Credit Financing, Automotive, Trading Materials, Building Materials and Other.

" Current low PBV ratings indicate that much of the bad news is already priced in, including higher costs and lower CPO prices. Our view of toppish cost has been confirmed but earnings will only benefit later in the year. CPO prices are still soft, hence overall upside catalyst is still weak. We suggest selective accumulation with KLK as our large integrated pick, PPB for growth of its consumer essentials and leisure business in SE Asia while HSPLANT’s dividend yields look sustainable."

What an unusual typo by Kenanga / i3 to mistake HSPLANT with HAPSENG. Interesting point about HSPLANT, being on Net Cash, zero borrowings although I feel a bit too early but this sector will return and timing (which I'm quite poor at) is very important. Whereas HAPSENG has significant plantation component but has other businesses as well and I like its dividend yield better. But at the right time, I might also want to get into HSPLANT one day, but not now, and will depend on how much HAPSENG exposure I have.

I missed today to add, as not around and didn't queue. Maybe tomorrow makes new low to add. The Net Asset is 3.11, so, targeting to hold own 3% of my portfolio in this stock at this price, so, may have to keep buying a little bit more on the way down. And then stop and wait for price to bottom and go back up (hopefully - although I always get the timing wrong).

trader808, HapSeng Cashflow in Q1 is actually positive. The decline of 288k you mentioned is because HapSeng increased Money Market deposits by 380k. If it didn't do that then its cash balance would go up. The figure i normally look at to assess its business from Operational perspective is Operational Cashflow - HapSeng Operational Cashflow for Q1/23 is 71,999k, vs Q1/22 of -363,098k. But this business is more complicated than what I just described.

As dividend investor, the question is will Hapseng cut dividends. Last year it paid 30 sen. The HCML sale actually net a substantial profit but maybe market is disappointed because HapSeng said it will use the proceeds to pare debt, instead of sharing with shareholders. hence, maybe market is thinking there is going to be greater financial control to pare down debts and reduce dividends ...

I am half expecting dividends to be cut this year, but I am not sure.

Hmmm ... don't think market cares what is written here ... despite all the scary predictions like 1.6 or "terrible business", price still holding. My 50/50 guess is there's going to be a few weeks of scaring down, fake down with lower lows, before it shoots up ... (50/50 means I don't know).

Mar2083 - definite downtrend. Don't catch a falling knife without a proven exit strategy.

wctberhad, not sure if can get down to as low as 1.7x ... last TTM, it paid 30 sen dividend. I am expecting dividend cuts to maybe 25 sen (?). hard to imagine this kind of counter giving 10% dividend yield, that's almost unheard of. But if it cuts dividend down to 20 sen, and gives 7.5% yield, it suggests a price of around 2.67. where there was a mini support back in 2014. But I really don't know man ... I'm now about 2% invested in this stock and hoping to nibble on its way down slowly. I like that on Weekly candle, RSI is oversold and it hasn't done this since 2006 and 2020.

speak, if kantoi means downtrending, fully agree. haven't decided if want to average down, but if it gets to 1.65 +/- 1-2 sen, I might get another small bit, maybe 0.4% capital or so ... it would be a tiny nibble.

mabel, I read what you write too.

kok, yeah, agree, market has a lot of time to digest the demerger coming to nearly 2 years now.

beluga, thanks for sharing. I actually didn't follow BIMB at that time, so, I just aware there is demerger in Sep 2021 completion. In general, that's probably old news already.

Jnlee, my portfolio is messy with over 40+ dividend stocks. Impossible to follow.

fortune, haha. If it goes down to 1.5, don't blame me. I really don't know where the bottom is.

Hi speak. Because of commissions in and out, I need BIMB to get back to <1.8 before I break even. But my goal is to hold out at much higher prices before thinking of selling in next 1-2 years. I'm about 4% invested, getting close to my 5% limit for 1 stock. I didn't buy much at 1.75 as I felt I've done enough for this week. Looks like still downtrending and can go lower, so, maybe I nibble again next week as it crashes down. I probably made a slight mistake in entry, I shouldn't be that "greedy" like when it's downtrending, never accumulate higher than 2.5% capital so that you buy on the way up, but I typically find myself, didn't buy on the way up, so, looks like I have to experience some big pain before I get to a full position.

For this kind of price move, whether your entry is 2 or 1.8 probably makes not much difference in a downtrend if one is only 4% invested. The control is the size you buy. Buy too much in a downtrend, it will really hurt. Buy a little during a downtrend, less hurt when price goes to say 1.5. 1.5/2 ~ 25% loss. 1.5/1.8 ~ 17% loss, both double digit losses.

Best is not to watch the price after entry ... :-)

3 months later, more bad quarterly report. More sell off ... now 48 sen.
What will the key Q2/2023 report show in August? Income distribution time then ... will ARREIT cut dividends some more in view of poor results?

Good to document and thanks for sharing your thoughts 2 years ago. At the time, price was 65 sen, today, 48 sen, or 27% drop. Are your views still the same, and are you still holding?

The NTA is broadly similar today vs 2 years ago, but price is 27% lower. Are you more excited to own more at lower prices?

2021 DPS (4.5 sen after tax) has dropped 31% since you last written. 2022 DPS is 3.07 sen after tax. Looks like market appears to be pricing relatively correctly i.e. price falls follow dividend cuts so far retrospectively. The question mark is always the future - how will future dividends be like?

ARREIT dividend keeps falling the past 5 years, every single year. If you ask me what will be 2023 dividend, I think more than 50/50 chance it will continue to fall. But last dividend was higher, so, maybe less than 50/50 chance it will continue to fall. Yet, this is visible to market, and earlier this year, price was higher than 65 sen. So, my guess is market knows something about ARREIT that is not good news, i.e. brace for even lower dividend in 2023, continuing the past 5 year trend of lower and lower dividends?

Last quarterly report showed that ARREIT earnings was hit by the Office segment, primarily Vista Tower. Net Property Income dropped YoY, from 13.4 down to 12.7m. Unfortunately, Finance costs spiked up YoY from 5.9m to 7.5m. What's left over after Finance cost is down from 4.3m down to 3.3m.

1 Quarter earnings of 3.3m, if annualized for 12 months is 13.2m is only 2.2 sen per share. At 48 sen per share the dividend yield will be around 4.6%, which is not too bad. I think it should be able to do more than 13.2m in 2023. This assumes it doesn't keep losing rental income.

The Vista tower purchase in 2017 I think is a mistake because it is such a huge purchase (523m relative to total assets of 1.2 billion) and comes with it high Finance costs, and now, rental is terrible but Finance costs becomes higher and continues. https://www.amanahrayareit.com.my/media/latest-news/amanahraya-reit-to-buy-the-intermarks-vista-tower/. Blackrock must be happy to dispose, they typically know something more.

ARREIT is asset rich, will it dispose one of its assets? At 48 sen market price, but NTA of nearly 1.30, a small sale should boost valuation hugely - use proceeds to pay off debts, become a cleaner REIT.

Management could have done this 3 years ago but didn't do anything. When will Management take action (if ever)?

ARREIT needs to pick a property and announce its intention to sell. Then, likely, the bottom is in. Until then, if next Quarterly report show worsening, price will keep falling.

EPF is going to give you 5%-6% every year over past 10 years. If you get a paper gain like 5-10 year equivalent to EPF, might as well capitalize it like if you get 30%-50% gain, sell some, keep the rest for longer term, because every year of dividends that you get, will keep lowering your average price.

In short, only use RSI on monthly candles, on stocks that consistently makes monies and not only make monies but shares the profits with their shareholders via nice dividend yields. Not many companies are like this, sometimes can wait for years, but when they come, start investing. The beauty is that when you have a profit later, you can still sell a bit (to release capital for future endeavours) and still own and collect dividends every year to lower your dividend cost with low risks when it is highly diversified portfolio. Safe way to beat EPF long term.

As long term investor, one of my favorite indicators is the RSI indicator when applied to monthly candlesticks. I use free Yahoo Finance chart, where BIMB stock price starts from Jan 2000, 23 years ago. During this 23 year period, there are 3 times in history when RSI is below 20.
- First time is around Apr-May 2001. If you start entering then and average down, you are near multi-month lows (you'll never know when is the low). Be patient and in less than a year, you are laughing. The gains are phenomenal.
- Second time is around Apr 2005. Here, if you bought, you would be stuck for 8 months until Dec 2005, when RSI is oversold again. But if you keep averaging down (and only invest less than 5% of your diversified portfolio), your average price should be around 0.94+0.75 say 0.85-0.90 (as you wouldn't keep buying more at lower prices too much in a diversified portfolio), and come July 2006 (around 1.5 years later after your first entry), you would be laughing!
- Third time is around Mar 2020. If you had bought, a few months later, you would be laughing.
- Now we are at 4th time. RSI is 18 at I write this. If history is a guide, within next 1-2 years, we should be laughing. But only if you have staying power, and only if you are not greedy and go "all in".

And I like its payout ratio is below 40% past 8 years. Means:
1. It makes money. E.g. last TTM is 23 sen. (so, 1.73 / 0.23 = 7.5 TTM P/E is not very demanding valuation).
2. It shares around 13.8 sen dividend last year (so, payout ratio = 13.8 / 23 ~ 60% which is not a bad sharing with shareholders).
3. It pays dividends once a year (which is acceptable to me, as I own a diversified dividend stocks and don't like these 4 times per year dividends - I prefer once or twice a year, but has a long history of paying out these dividends). So, I can be relatively assured, based on its long history, that it will pay dividend again end this year when it makes monies and so far, no reason why not. E.g. Q1/23 EPS was 5.33 sen, and even in the worst covid times, lowest earnings is 3.84, 4.08 and 4.95 sen so, if I assume the worst earnings in next 3 quarters, total = 5.33 + 3.84 + 4.08 + 4.95 = 18.2 sen and times 60% payout ratio suggests dividends should not fall below ~ 11 sen. Thats around 6.4% dividend yield if its business, over next 3 quarters, earns the lowest 3 quarter of EPS. That beats EPF. So, I'm comfortable to have my monies to keep buying BIMB, unless for next 3 quarters, its earnings are worst than the lowest 3 quarterly earnings over past 8 years (which seems less likely to me).

As Buffett says, if you cannot stomach a 50% fall from your entry price, you should never be a stock investor. Go do something else. For me, if it falls down another 50% from here, I welcome as look at that dividend yield.

fortune, 1.5 could also be hit, as noone really knows, it's an uncertainty. As for fair price, it could be fair for a short while, before market changes its mind on what the fair price might be. Market is fickled. Today it thinks fair is 1.73. A year ago, it thought fair was around 3. Market can never decide what is fair.

On Monthly chart, looks to me, next support level could be around 1.64. This is close to 1.63, its opening price in Jan 2000, 23 years ago :-)