Dividends received for April and May 2014

Summary of dividends received for April 2014:

1. First state dividend advantage (unit trust) - 97.48 (16Apr)

2. Sembcorp Marine - 80 (14 May)

3. Sabana - 56.40 (30 May)

In March, I bought 4lots of ums at 0.795 and sold them in April at 0.845. I made a small profit of 143.16.

In April, I sold 3lots of Far East h trust at 0.85. I made a small profit of 63.96.

Both ums and Far East h trust share price continue to be uptrend after I sold the shares. 

I sold all my first state dividend advantage units for 9800SGD in April because I was not happy with the service provided by Maybank financial services officer.  

This means I need to find a stock to park 9800SGD equivalent amount to earn about 98SGD or more in dividends/cash payout per quarter. I have decided to invest in 1 lot of Sembcorp Marine at 4.00SGD.

I have also sold all my hph trust shares in May at 0.72USD per share. I am still looking at which stock to invest in.

In May, I bought 1 lot of TIH at 1.405. I made a mistake of not waiting for a few weeks before deciding to purchase TIH again.

Changing Jobs is good for you

“As a rule you need to be moving jobs at least every five years,” says Michael Moran at careers consulting service 10Eighty. “Generally, you will learn a lot but contribute nothing for the first 18 months and you will pay back that learning time in the next 18 months. After that, if you’re not learning anything new you must move on.

“If you’ve worked for one company for 15 years, there are two things I can guarantee you of,” adds Moran ominously. “Firstly, you will be paid 10-15% less than the market rate. Secondly, you will be less employable than if you’ve worked for a selection of firms. People will have more respect for you if you’ve worked for the competition. And if you’ve worked for three companies your network will be far bigger than if you’ve only worked for one.”

Heather McGregor, an ex-banker and director of search firm Taylor Bennett, says changing jobs too often is a bad thing, as is changing jobs too infrequently. “If you move between several jobs after less than two years in each one, you will lose credibility,” she says. “However, if you’ve been in a job for more than seven years you should be regularly challenging yourself. – Are you still learning? Are you still making progress?”

Women have a particular tendency to cling to the same job for years and years, says McGregor: “The longer you work somewhere, the easier it is to do your job – you know where things are and women tend to have more extraneous demands upon their time.”

Fundamentally, you should never get too comfortable. The real tragedy is that people in banking spend 20 years working for the same firm and then get ejected in their mid-40s, says Moran. At that point, it can be very hard to find anything new. “If a company’s getting rid of you because you don’t have the skills it wants, the chances are that the rest of the market won’t want you either,” Moran adds. “If you’ve worked for two to three companies, you’re far more likely to be up to date.”

Divorce matters on HDB

If there are no children from the marriage, the divorced party (flat owner) may retain the flat under the Single Singapore Citizen (SSC) Scheme, provided:

he / she is a Singapore citizen

he / she is at least 35 years old

the matrimonial flat must be a resale flat purchased from the open market without the CPF Housing Grant for Family.

Alternatively, the divorced party may include another person to retain the flat, subject to the prevailing eligibility criteria and eligibility scheme regardless of the occupation period.

If the divorced owners wish to resell their flat in the open market, they must have completed the MOP for the flat, as at the date of divorce completion. If the divorce is within the MOP and none of the owners is eligible to retain the flat, the owners may have to return the flat to HDB, subject to HDB's approval. The compensation for the return of flat will be determined by HDB.