Syfe Portfolio Update – June 2020

On By Mr BudgetIn Syfe

Hi everyone!

Following our monthly updates on our financial goals and expenses, we have also been keeping a record on our Syfe investments.

As we’ve probably mentioned a lot of times before, we view Syfe as our “professionally managed” portion of our portfolio. Syfe, as a roboadvisor, is also an affordable way for us to invest in multiple baskets of ETFs globally, hence gives us more diversification to our overall portfolio.

Here’s our monthly Syfe portfolio summary.

June 2020

Global Equity Portfolio
Total invested: S$7,572.12
Total Contribution this month: S$2,000 (June & July S$1,000 each)
Current Value: S$8134.20
Portfolio Return: 7.42%
Downside Risk: 25%

REIT Portfolio
Total invested: S$7,670.01
Total Contribution this month: S$1000
Current Value: S$8,202.90
Portfolio Return: 6.95%

Equity100
Total invested: S$1000
Total Contribution this month: S$1000
Current Value: S$996.65
Portfolio Return: -0.33%

The continued rebound in market share prices has further pushed our portfolio into the positive returns territory, which is definitely good news. And as we’ve mentioned in our recent post, we have started a new portfolio with Syfe, investing in their new Equity100 portfolio.

We are not too concerned about the returns as we will continue to put in regular contribution to Syfe monthly, and hopefully 5 to 10 years later we will be able to see the returns. 

Will Syfe give us a good return, better than what CPF SA is giving us? Only time will tell. 🙂

You might be interested in previous months update too:

Global Equity:
January 2020: S$2009.00 (-0.25%)
February 2020: S$4248.60 (-6%)
March 2020: S$4918.86 (-11.09%)
April 2020: N/A
May 2020: S$5,497.84 (-1.33%)
June 2020: S$8134.20 (7.42%)

REIT+
February 2020: S$3075.90 (-2.35%)
March 2020: S$4333.10 (-6.82%)
April 2020: N/A
May 2020: S$6,903.46 (3.5%)
June 2020: S$8,202.90 (6.95%)

Equity100
June 2020: S$0

Based on our records, the negative performances are now slowly moving into a positive return to our portfolio.

Looking to invest via Syfe? You can use our referral code: SRP6X8B8Y when you create an account.

We would both get $10 to $100 depending on your first deposit amount, and you’d receive your bonus within 5 business days.

Like our Facebook Page for more articles like this: Mr Mrs Budget

23 thoughts on “Syfe Portfolio Update – June 2020”

  1. Hi Mr Budget,

    I am curious to know what is the total expense ratio of the underlying ETFs in the Equity100 portfolio? I, too, had recently written an article on the Syfe Equity100 portfolio, but I do not have any insights in the composition of the portfolio as I do not own one. How much is the total cost after adding Syfe’s management fee and the expense ratio of the underlying ETFs?

    PS: Thanks for your referral code, I used yours to open a Syfe account previously.

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    1. Mr Budget

      Hello sir!

      Just dropped a note to Syfe and they told me that its 0.17%, quite close to your estimation. Saw your article too – great read but probably a bit technical. :p

      Thanks for using the referral code! That’s probably contributed to the returns on our portfolio so far!

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  2. John

    Hi Mr Budget,

    Thanks for sharing this info on Syfe!

    Based on your investment portfolio, I am seeing your exposure to US shares already and since so, wouldn’t your investment in Syfe becomes an overlap to your overall exposure?

    Look forward to your thoughts on this!

    Thanks,
    John

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    1. Mr Budget

      Hi John!

      Yes you are right! Ideally we’d want more US exposure – probably at least 60% of our overall portfolio.

      The reason is we believe that adding exposure to tech / high growth stocks will boost our overall returns: https://mrmrsbudget.com/2020/05/20/what-weve-learnt-this-covid19-using-us-stocks-to-boost-overall-portfolio-gain/

      Our own managed portfolio has a higher SG portfolio exposure for now, for Mr Budget, its almost 50 % SG and 50% US but even more so for Mrs Budget’s own portfolio (35% US). So we will still be adding more US stocks into our own managed portfolio.

      For Syfe, its almost 50%-50% now between REIT+ vs Global Equity/Equity100, and ideally we’d like to increase our exposure to US equities more. Hence we mentioned that we will be contributing more to Global Equity/Equity100 every month.

      Not too worried about the overlap for Syfe with our own portfolio as we are looking for overall returns when we look at Syfe’s performance. We also view Syfe separately from our own portfolio as we are treating it as our “emergency fund” and we are not actively managing it – just putting it there and let Syfe do their magic. 🙂

      Another reason we are not too worried about the overlap is that our Syfe portfolio is still relatively small as compared to our overall equity portfolio, hence the volatility due to possible overexposure to US stocks is still quite small and manageable.

      But you are right in pointing this out – one should track their Syfe portfolio together with their overall portfolio to ensure that you get the right mix of US – non US percentage.

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  3. Great post! I’ve also recently started investing into Syfe’s Equity100 portfolio. Prior to that I have been reading your blog and decided to try out Syfe. Just a question, if returns from Syfe were to outperform the DIY portion of your holdings, will you ditch DIY completely and go all in on Syfe?

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    1. Mr Budget

      Hi Beanstock!

      Great question! We never really thought about this.

      I think we will never stop DIY stock picking simply because there are great companies that we love and they are not invested by Syfe.

      Syfe invests in ETFs and normally ETFs dont include new and fast growing companies (your Zooms, SEAs, PDD, Fastlys). Hence you may miss out of these “speculative” high growth stocks. Also for Syfe’s REIT+ for example, there may be some REITs that we want to have a higher allocation, hence we will end up buying them on our own.

      The flipside of your question is, if our portfolio outperform Syfe, will we stop contributing to Syfe?

      Currently our own portfolio is outperforming Syfe, but that’s because we entered Syfe at a bad time and covid came. In the long run, I think we will still continue to contribute to Syfe because we treat it as our emergency fund / additional side portfolio that we may use for our children.

      So Syfe is really a backup portfolio / emergency fund that we set aside for our rainy days, with a long time frame in mind (at least 5 – 10 years), forcing ourselves to have a long term mind set towards portfolio management.

      That’s for our case – but for many, Syfe may be the main portfolio.

      If Syfe is part of the main portfolio composition, then I would think I will ditch DIY completely and go all in on Syfe. This is because the returns are outperforming and we should always optimize for returns. Perhaps more importantly, its less stressful to do regular DCA into Syfe, as compared to doing DIY stock picking and monitoring, where you will always be emotionally challenged by the market price movements. Peace of mind is also very valuable! 🙂

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    1. Mr Budget

      Hi DC!

      We contribute around the first week of every month. 🙂 Yes we contribute regardless of the price.

      Although now that may change a bit as we are changing the % contribution. It used to be that we will contribute 1k each to the global equity account and the REIT+ account, but now there is the Equity100 portfolio, hence we are now putting 1k to Equity100 and 500 500 to the global equity and REIT+ account. But we dont look at the prices.

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  5. HH

    Hi, are you concern about the charges from Syfe eating into the returns? As the charges will increase as the amount invested with them grows.
    Also, robo advisors like Kristal.AI charges no fees for the first $50,000. Is there any reason why you choose to invest in Syfe versus other robo-advisors? Thanks.

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    1. Mr Budget

      Hi HH,

      Not too worried yet – I think so far the fees that Syfe is charging is among the lowest.

      If you compare Syfe against other instruments actually robo fees are quite reasonable. I think as we enjoy the service of companies, we should at least pay some fees so that they can continue to operate 🙂

      On why we choose Syfe – their portfolio breakdown and investment thesis is aligned with our investment thesis. For example, REIT+ consist of all SG quality reits that we want to buy ourselves but are too expensive for us to do so.

      Beyond that, Syfe actually reached out to us to help us understand their product and they are always one message away in terms of responding to our queries – hence we were won over by the customer outreach and customer support. I think that played a big part too. 🙂

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      1. Heng Hou Ching

        Thanks Mr Budget. Yes I quite like their portfolio in general especially the Equity 100 as I believe in their analysis and methodology based on my own experience.

        Given that the Global Portfolio is risk managed, may I know why are you doing DCA for it? Wouldn’t DCA be more suitable for the REIT + or equity 100 portfolio as they are more volatile?

        Also, you have your own reits already. May I know why you still invest in REIT +? Thank you

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      2. Mr Budget

        Hi Heng Hou!

        For us DCA is a method of staying consistently invested in the market irregardless of whether the portfolio is risk managed or not. We have set aside X amount to DCA every month into Syfe.

        We are doing DCA into all 3 now to see which provides a higher return to us and may shift our DCA allocation based on their returns as well as our desired portfolio allocation between US stocks and SG REITs. For now we want a higher exposure to US stocks hence our DCA is more towards the global portfolio and equity100.

        Also we are continuing our DCA to the global portfolio too because it may provide a higher return than the equity100 although it is less volatile. So we dont really know for sure. 🙂

        For REIT+, the same thing, we treat it as a monthly DCA to buy into the sg quality reits.

        We continue to invest in REIT+ because it is very expensive for us to individually buy the quality counters ourselves every month.

        Eg for Keppel DC REIT , AREIT, MLT etc, we cant see ourselves buying their individual counters now and for us to buy, it will only make sense (fee wise) to buy in lots of S$5k – S$10k. See: https://mrmrsbudget.com/2019/12/13/what-is-the-ideal-stock-amount-to-buy-for-the-brokerage-fees-to-make-sense/

        But REIT+ allow us to buy a basket of quality reits every month with no min lot size! It’s quite crazy – i can own all the quality reits from as low as S$10!

        There is no right or wrong answer but this is just our thoughts! Also want to give a disclaimer that we are not financially trained and we are not financial advisers, just a normal couple trying to figure things out too! 🙂

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    1. Mr Budget

      Hi Rose!

      No Syfe does not enable joint account opening.

      Officially the account is held under my name with Syfe, but unofficially, the source of fund is from both Mrs Budget and myself monthly, and we both can access the account. And both of us also have full transparency of both of assets and cash flows. 🙂

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      1. Rose

        Thanks for your prompt response to my query!

        I guess this method works as long there are mutual trust and transparency between both.

        My only concern is if smtg bad were to happen to the main account holder, the settlement procedure will be complex.

        Since you & partner seeks to diversify the current portfolio to get more exposure into the US market, did you consider getting popular S&P500 etfs like VOO or IVV rsp into your portfolio? why & why not?

        I’m taking into consideration between Syfe vs Fsmone’s portfolio.

        May i have your opinion on the Fsmone’s portfolio?

        Appreciate your kind advice!

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      2. Mr Budget

        Hi Rose!

        Thanks for this! Yeah we never thought of what will happen if something bad were to happen to either of us. We will be covering that with a will so that probably helps.

        On diversification – there are a lot of ETFs out there and I think most works. We did not look at other ETFs because there are simply too many for us to look at. Hence roboadvisor is like our “professional ETF picker” and we trust that Syfe has done all the research to choose the best mix of ETFs for us.

        As long as you are comfortable with the ETF composition and cost, you can go with whichever that you want. 🙂

        Took a quick look at FSMOne – our quick thought is that they offer access to too many ETFs and we dont know where to start haha. So Roboadvisors like Syfe / Stashaway is probably more well suited for us.

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  7. Rose

    Yes, couldn’t agree more! There are just too many etfs available in the market.

    I quite like the Equity100 portfolio which Syfe offers.

    Possible to share more on how you fund this portfolio since its in USD currency. Did you try using the online payment services like Transferwise?

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    1. Mr Budget

      Hi Rose!

      We just transferred sgd to our syfe account and they will do the purchase for us. 🙂 quite fuss free for the end user.

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  8. Hi!

    I read that there is withholding tax of 30% & Estate duty for Equity100.

    I understand that estate duty only applies upon death and amount more than US 60,000 (correct me if im wrong), so i assume this should not affect anything if nothing happens to us…?
    For withholding tax, it applies to our dividends..?

    Would like to know your take on above.
    Do you think this would affect the projected returns?

    Thanks in advance!

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  9. LK

    Is there a way to compare among the robos, which actually performs better? Syfe equity 100 dynamic factor rebalancing, I’m not too sure when the factor really changed, how long it will take to switch and their results are all backtested results…..Having a hard time to decide which robot o go for…

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    1. Mr Budget

      Hi LK,

      Yeaps i think there are backtesting softwares to backtest the performance of the various robo – but it’s probably a bit too much work for us to do that.

      I think in the general scheme of things, most robo should have roughly similar return performance for diff risk levels. I think inactivity may cost even more in the long run! If you like the robo’s underlying assets invested, i think you can start with the few popular ones! Stashaway / syfe is pretty good!

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