Sorry Mr Cat Stevens, but life’s too short and boring not to make any changes, and so I’ve decide it’s time to shake things up a little and see if I can improve my lifestyle, and also my investments.
To begin with, I’ve bought a new car! Well new to me. It was second hand of course, I’m not an idiot you know. And yes I know there wasn’t anything really wrong with my old one, but I’ve always wanted a 4×4 that I could take camping, particularly after the campervan trip we went on last year, so when I saw this one with the built in roof tent I just had to have it. Well worth the R350k I think, especially since I managed to get a below prime car loan.
There is one problem though, it doesn’t really fit into our complex underground parking lot with that tent on top, so the wife and I have decided to bite the bullet and buy a house. Yes I know I said I’d never own another house, but we’ve wanted a garden for our dogs for some time now, clearly I can’t keep parking on the 
street, and the bond rate has just been lowered by 0.25%, so I’d better buy now before the house prices start shooting up.
We could probably get by with a small 1 bed, but for the first time ever I’ll be splitting the costs with someone else, which means we can get so much more house for the same payment I had with my last one. I’ve worked and saved really hard for so long now, so why not splurge a little, I deserve it. And anyway, houses are good investments after all.
Another big change I’ve implemented since Cyril took over is to bring my money back into SA. With all the good news that’s streaming in at the moment, the South African economy can only prosper going forward. The exchange rate isn’t the best for dollar to Rand conversions at the moment, but wait till you see what happens when we undoubtedly hit 5% growth in the near future.
Of course I’m not keeping my money in cash, it will be invested. Thanks to this research from MoneyWeb’s Patrick Cairns I’ve decided to split my money among the best performing funds over a 10 year period, all of which have beaten the index, and considering the 10 year timeframe that’s a result I can trust. 25% of it went into the ABSA Property Equity Fund. They’ve been the top performer in SA over the last 10 years and have convincingly beaten the market with returns of 17.75%! That’s truly amazing, a few more years of that performance and I’ll be totally sitting pretty, I can’t wait.
To diversify, I also put 25% into the next best, the Coronation Industrial Fund which did 16.35%, and another 25% into the third best, the Discovery Flexible Property Fund which did 15.49%. That means I have at least three fund managers backed by large companies who hire only the most intelligent minds in the country and make them work countless overtime hours just to make me money.
You might be wondering where the last 25% is going? Well I’ve decided to take a calculated risk. You see most people know that there are only ever going to be 21 million Bitcoins in circulation, but what many people don’t realise is that 4 million of them have actually been lost forever, leaving us with a maximum of just 17 million. With 7 billion people on the planet, even if everyone decides to buy a fraction of a bitcoin, they’re sure to shoot up in value significantly. I’ve looked at a number of technical indicators, and everything seems to line up with us being on the cusp of a big bull run.
If the above chart doesn’t convince you, you can rest assured that crypto is so much more than just a fad. I’m a software developer, so I know how clever the technology is behind it, and with them priced at about a third of their all time high it’ll be almost impossible to lose money. An added bonus is the decentralised nature of the technology, which means that even if we end up with another Zuma in this country, they won’t be able to touch me on my bitcoins.
Don’t let the FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt) get to you, bitcoin has lost more than half it’s value many times before and each time it’s just rocketed back up again and then on to spectacular new highs. Buy and HODL until we go to the moon!
Oh and since you’re here, happy April fools day!
And just to be clear:
- Spending large sums of your money on transport (purchase, interest, insurance, depreciation, fuel etc.) is a surefire way to stay broke.
- House prices have barely increased at over inflation for all of the recorded history. Unless you can see the future and can buy in an area that’s undervalued and due for growth which isn’t already priced in, you’d be far better of just renting. Money wise at least, there may be other factors involved in the decision of course.
- By the time you think it’s a good time to move money into a different economy to get some growth it’s already too late. Even if SA does outstandingly well in future, it’s probably already priced in.
- The latest active vs passive scorecard from S&P is out, over the last 5 years 93.2% of active funds underperformed compared to the index. Good luck to you if you think you can pick one of the 6.8% of funds that outperformed, don’t be an idiot.
- Go ahead and “invest” in bitcoin, but please make sure you diversify adequately into beanie babies and tulips.
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