A journey of thousand miles begins with a single step 千里之行，始于足下。

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SLC@54

Thank you Sifu Chua.

Since the beginning, I had always been fascinated by your investment methodology - using the big numbers approach to value investing.

Although we do not have a lot of shares in common, every month, I will look at your top 30 ranks and have a sensing of these small cap performance.

I have a confession. I had never act on your ideas. I merely observe and try to feel the actions in this space. Never buy or sell any stocks based on your posting... except now.

Before I brought SLC, I went into your blog and I'm convinced that SLC would be a good buy.

Some of your comments is rather encouraging and precisely at this moment that I sense that SLC transformation journey had just begin... 
that I pull the trigger during this Phase-2 (Heightened Alert) period.

I think the time is ripe and extracted your comments for recording purposes in vb.com

May 2014
it is also an asset play as they own a portfolio of hotels in Australia. Some of them have good redevelopment value, while some could be sold to unlock value. This stock is also for patient investors who don't mind waiting as they slowly unlock value for shareholders.

June 2014
Returned to my top 30 list due to good performance

November 2016
I think St****** do have good assets in Australia and their re-developments should also return some profits. The problem is that shareholders might not be patient enough to wait for value to be realized, as in the case of many asset plays. Also, the cut in dividend payout for the past FY might not sink in well for many shareholders, resulting in the stock's underperformance for the past one year. I hope that my patience will pay off one day in St****** and had been adding into my position for the past one year.

May 2017
It is indeed disappointing that dividend was only 1cts from St******, but the result was not as good due to impairment of Dynon’s Plaza.
Granted that Macquarie project was completed but they only recognized 174 out of 710 apartments in FY17.
Therefore, most of the revenue will still be booked in FY18 and beyond.
I don't know why the dividend payout is still low but based on EPS of 4cts in FY17, he is paying out 25% of the profits.
All of the operating cash flow in Q417 went to repaying bank borrowings.
Might be a change of dividend policy or he has other investments in mind that he needs to conserve cash.

April 2020
the rationale behind my purchases of these companies is very simple. They are stocks currently trading at deep value and backed by solid physical assets.

In term of your SLC investment journey, I had also taken some notes:
Reported first buy @ Sep 2010
Reported last buy @ Feb 2021
Best Ranking - 8 @ Aug 2019, Dec 2019 and Jan 2021

Thanks for reading.
Don't know what to do?
Enjoy:


Hope you enjoy a fruitful journey too. Gratitude! 

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SLC@54

Thank you Sifu Chua on the monthly update.
To me, it's amazing that SLC is Ranked #2 in your portfolio.
Not sure about your feeling and we definitely wanted to see your next action steps on SLC.

Thank you very much as I benefited from your choice too.



   

https://drive.google.com/uc?id=1NibpdSO_...oxqks6xxLF

Gratitude.


Looking forward to hear from you soon.


Top 30 Holdings (Sing$ Denominated shares)
1. iFAST
2. SLC
3. PM Data
4. GK Goh
5. The Hour Glass
6. Hong Fok
7. Hong Leong Finance
8. CFM
9. Haw Par
10. Frencken
11. Metro Holdings
12. Sing Investment & Finance
13. EnGro
14. Bukit Sembawang Estates
15. Hotel Properties
16. Bonvests
17. Isetan
18. Hotel Grand Central
19. A-REIT
20. Far East Orchard
21. Yeo Hiap Seng
22. Tat Seng
23. SGX
24. Hotel Royal
25. Singapura Finance
26. Singapore Land Group
27. Hiap Hoe
28. CapitaLand Integrated Commercial Trust
29. Amara
30. LHT

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SLC@53

Another blogger wrote about SLC back in 2017:
http://boringinvestor.blogspot.com/2017/...uable.html

Some hotels could be very valuable:
The next hotel group I studied was St******. It is a property developer focusing on the Australian and NZ markets and owns 7 hotels in Australia and NZ. Unlike Grand Central, St****** does not revalue its properties. The hotels were mostly acquired between 1994 and 2000. The current book value of the hotels is $375.0M.

However, before you get too excited, value stocks need a catalyst in order for the market to recognise their value. The reason why St****** is undervalued is because it has not sold its hotels in the past 20 years. There is no reason to believe why it will sell them now or in the next 20 years and return the money to shareholders. For this reason, I did not buy a lot of it.

In conclusion, hotels are boring business. But they could be very valuable!

Under the comments, 
INTJ says:
From your blog post, I gather you like these hotel companies because they are a good asset play and holding land that are well above their present share price.

If your analysis is correct , buying these securities present a significant margin of safety as they are heavily undervalued and if the owners are willing to liquidate its holdings.
However, is it too presumptous to buy these undervalued assets, especially if there is no one willing to liquidate them? Hotel businesses are known for their cyclical cash flow and you might not want to stomach the volatility while waiting indefinitely for liquidators to come. Unless you have a very long time horizon, these picks might not be for everyone .

Lee Chin Wai added: Agree there's no near term catalyst to unlock shareholder value. Have to be very patient with such stocks.

Gratitude.




Thanks for reading.

[Image: 43275_14051314220019401705.jpg]

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INTJ aka Caveat Emptor
http://caveat-emptor-venditor.blogspot.c...roval.html

After boringinvestor published some hotels could be valuable in 2017.
INTJ give his stamp of approval for St****** after the issues was amiably resolved.



Stamford Plaza Auckland
[Image: banner_Stamford_Plaza_Auckland.jpg]


Gratitude.

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Alvin Chow aka Dr Wealth

8/8/2020 Alvin wrote a post on hotel stocks
https://www.drwealth.com/hotel-stocks-ar...ll-return/

What to do next?
In such situations, I would lay down some considerations.

First, I have mentioned that upscale is probably the segment that would recover the earliest (reasons: business travels, staycation and unlikely disrupted by Airbnb).

Second, countries that are business hubs and have Covid-19 under control will stand a better chance to receive more travellers. Singapore, China and Australia are some countries that came to mind. That said, I think countries like U.S. will still do okay because of the vibrant business activities scene, despite seeing infections on the rise. I would avoid exotic places such as Maldives (or resort types) because I do not think leisure travel will recover so soon but they may surprise if the rich can’t wait to relax at a remote resort. A dark horse I would say.

That would narrow my choices to Shangri-La, Hotel Properties, Amara, Mandarin Oriental, St******, ARA US HTrust, Frasers HTrust and CDL HTrust based on the above qualitative filters.






Stamford Plaza Auckland


Gratitude!

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SLC@54

Looking at those posts by Sifu Chua, boringinvestor, Caveat Emptor and Dr Wealth, there are 2 common themes:

1. undervalue upscale properties
   
2. no chance of unlocking it's value
   

These 2 points implied that SLC would be a value trapped and valuebuddies invested in these type of stocks will need to wait a long long time before the value could be released.



Gratitude.

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SLC@52

You might not realised, but this actually captured my thoughts and my learning experience too.

I was the lucky few who had attended Quidel "Quick vue at home ART test kit" training, in order to support the distribution of ART for the recent erupted C19 Clusters budding everywhere in Singapore.

At first, I did something stupid.
I noticed that there are a QR code and URL on the distribution brochures and was happily asking those collecting the ART kits to visit the website and watch the video on how to use the ART kits.
I did check the URL, it's the same as what was given during yesterday training session, so I thought the URL contains the how-to-use video.

Boy, how wrong was my assumption.

After happily pointing the QR code/URL to the Collectors for a while, then I had a chance to scan the QR code to show my colleagues, that I realised that it was for another ART test kit. 

I quickly find the one video that I had attended (which is for Quidel Quick-Vue-at-home test kit) and was a bit of panicky on how to disseminate this video to the Collectors.

Because, in my mind, it's not so straight forward to read the instruction or watching the wrong video and attempt to make sense on how-to.

Then, one of my colleagues who had work experience using ART kit mentioned that typically, there are instruction inside the test kit and just need to tell the Collector to use the instruction inside and should be ok.

I was thinking "my foot". I think it will takes a PHD to read and be able to carry out the instruction on first attempt, in order to conduct a correct bio-physics exam.

The "correct" video is the only way aka not the paper instruction.

Then, a light bulk strike and I noticed a QR code on the Quidel box.  I scan and a video pop up.

It's different from the one I received my training but it's closed enough.  I think majority of the Collector, who is elderly, would be able to see the video and conduct the bio-physics exam correctly.


What a relief. Now, we just need to ask the uncles and aunties to scan and watch the video on the box.

Without watch the video, at best the ART kits will expired after 2023, at worst, all the test would be negative or invalid and produce unnecessary confusions to the medical staffs who attend to them.

For the record, this is the website with the correct video - for those who need to use Quidel ART kits:
https://www.quickvueathome.com.sg/



Gratitude.

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Good morning, vaulebuddies.
Wish everyone a good day ahead.

I couldn't resist myself, when I notice the newly introduce regulation in China - not for profit tuition.
http://baijiahao.baidu.com/s?id=17061643...der&for=pc


This really impacted my recent foray into China stocks.
Thinking thinking thing....


Gratitude.
Thank you all the valuebuddies for helping me in my investment journey.
Thank you. 

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Gratitude.
Valuebuddies might know that I enjoy reading SGX announcements.

Today, there are a series of airbag gotten triggered just before lunch time.

I just pen down one of the airbag as part of my investment journey.

In parallel, I'm getting ready to for the action... hopefully soon.






Wish me luck!
And thank you Adam for putting everything in to the right directions.
Gratitude!

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Scars in Heaven.
If I had only known the last time would be the last time

I would've put off all the things I had to do
I would've stayed a little longer, held on a little tighter
Now what I'd give for one more day with you
'Cause there's a wound here in my heart where something's missing
And they tell me that it's gonna heal with time
But I know you're in a place where all your wounds have been erased
And knowing yours are healed is healing mine




With the onset of C19, let's look out for each other, especially those that's close to you.

Gratitude.