Date: June 12, 2024
Hello to all of our members and subscribers,
It gives me great pleasure to address you and provide you with an update on initiatives SIAS will be undertaking this month, as well as what the external investment environment looks like. We have prepared programmes to bring the latest developments in the market and your investments.
SIAS’s Investor Education Programme in June 2024
Apart from our regular Weekly Market Reviews, which are conducted by our speaker and moderator Gerald Wong and Lead Technical Analyst Sunny Soh every Monday, we will be hosting our Ask SIAS session on Wednesday, 12 June between 7pm and 8pm.
Also hosted by Gerald and Sunny, Ask SIAS gives you the opportunity to ask our market experts your burning questions relating to your investments.
A week later on 19 June, you can attend our one-hour educational lesson on “Introduction to Fixed Income (Bonds)” between 7-8pm. This session will be conducted by SIAS’s senior editor and trainer R. Sivanithy, a former senior journalist with The Business Times and Master Trainer with the Institute for Financial Literacy.
The very next day on Thursday 20 June SIAS will host a dialogue session with OCBC on behalf of Great Eastern Holdings shareholders. This has arisen because of OCBC’s offer to privatise Great Eastern that was announced in May at a price of $25.60 per GE share.
This dialogue session is aimed at giving GE shareholders a chance to clear all doubts they may have regarding the offer.
Last but by no means least, on 25 June investors can log on to our Corporate Connect featuring Thakral Corporation. Corporate Connect is a continuing online programme that aims to give the investing public the chance to get to know lesser-known companies.
These Corporate Connect sessions which include presentations by the respective company’s top management and are moderated by SIAS have proven valuable in allowing many firms to reach a wider audience.
The external environment
US interest rate concerns remain the main concern of Wall Street as well as the local market. At the start of the year, the market was expecting at least three interest rate cuts this year; however, as of now, those expectations have been reduced to only one cut, possibly in September.
The main reason is that US inflation is proving “sticky’’ or difficult to bring down from its current level of about 3.6% to the US Federal Reserve’s preferred target of 2%.
Nevertheless, despite the likelihood of interest rates staying higher for longer, Wall St’s stocks have risen to all-time highs, driven mainly by the tech sector whose rally is being led by a heavy play on Artificial Intelligence or AI.
I hope you will all participate in our forthcoming sessions, and I look forward to addressing you in July to provide you with my next update.
David Gerald
Founder, President & CEO, SIAS
12 June 2024
