Posted by calvintaneng > 2021-09-19 17:48 | Report Abuse

3) This is the Most Important lesson of all. Mr. Liew from Tawau bought those Oil Palm lands for only Rm500 an acre in those days. In year 1993 he sold half his plantations and moved to KL & started a Used Car Company in Kajang called Helang Camar. The timing was impecabble as he was in the midst of the GoGo Years before the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997/8.

Times were great and he was doing a roaring business. Monies kept rolling in and piling up! He was so happy with the fast pace of money making in KL compared to the slow snail and dull business of tending oil palm plantations in Sabah.

He wanted to sell off the other half of his slow moving oil palm business in Tawau, Sabah and put all his capital into KL's Car Business. This was in year 1996 - near the very peak of the Boom!

At this time Used Car Dealers would make multiple bookings for New Proton & Perodua Cars. Some booked 50 units & some booked in hundreds. Waiting list for cars stretched from 4 months for a Proton Wira to as long as One Year wait for a New Proton Perdana!

To get hold of a New Proton Perdana then you have to pay as much as "Rm10,000" extra! to get one. Such was the extremely over heated market of the GoGo Years.

I was happy to have warned him not to do so as the future is unknown (Asian Financial Crisis arrived in 1997 just one short year away)

And when the Asian Financial Crisis Struck! All the 3 years of accumulate profits that Mr. Liew made were wiped out in just 3 short months! At that time a Proton Iswara 1.3 worth Rm33,000 before the crisis could crash 50% to only Rm16,500 (50% Value Wiped Off in just months)

So many gone bankrupt with the twin collapse of KLSE (Crash from a high of 1332 to its lowest at 262 points) & all assets (Houses, cars, businesses - everything fell like tent pins in unison.) There was no escape but facing total lost and imminent bankruptcies for all those who over leveraged.

It was during these dark and bleak times that Oil Palms gave him solace. And to his surprice CPO prices shot up! And lifted him from his gloom and compensate his losses in his Used Car Business.

As the US has still not resolved its problems & the world still awashed in crude oil it behoves us to go defensive & diversify our investments as future is still unknown.

I hope all i3 Fellow Forumers will be careful with your investments.

Always remember, Return OF capital is more important than return ON capital