Top 3 STI Performers in 2014!

Happy holidays to all of you out there! Coming to the end of 2014, we here at VIA felt that it was appropriate to take stock of the year of how the Singapore market, especially the STI ETF (SGX:ES3) has performed so far!

 

Today, we would be looking at the TOP THREE performers of the STI ETF! You might actually be surprised at them 🙂

However, before that, we would first show you how the STI ETF has performed YTD. YTD simply refers to year-to-date, basically starting from the calendar year of Jan 1 to current day. Given that we are already in the final week of 2014, we felt that it was a decent representation of the year’s performance.

 

How Has An Investor In The STI ETF Done For Himself In 2014?

As at Jan 2, 2014, the STI ETF traded at S$3.22 per share and on Dec 22, 2014 it was S$3.37/share.

To make things simpler, imagine buying 1,000 shares at the start of the year. Hence your YTD capital gains would be = (S$3.37-S$3.22)*1,000 shares = S$150 or a profit of 5%.

However, let’s not forget about an important thing called dividends! In 2014, the STI ETF paid out 2 rounds of dividends totalling up to S$0.88 per share and at 1,000 shares = S$88 – over 50% of your capital gains! That is how important dividends are.

Inclusive of dividends, your total gain would be = S$150 + S$88 = S$238

For a STI ETF investor, one would have a total gain of 7% in 2014!

 

Now For The Fun Part – Introducing The Top 3 STI ETF Performers in 2014

1. Olam International Ltd (SGX:O32)

Many might be surprised to find Olam within the top 3! But we assure you that it definitely deserved a place at the top with a whooping YTD capital gain of 37%! And this was before accounting for dividends of S$0.075/share (Dividend yield of 4.9% of Jan 2, 2014 purchase price). Inclusive of dividends, Olam’s total gains was over 40%, not too bad for a year’s return!

In a nutshell, Olam is a leading agri-business operating from seed to shelf in over 65 countries, supplying food and industrial raw material to over 13,800 customers worldwide.

After getting hit by a short seller’s report, 2013 wasn’t a very good year for Olam. However 2014 proved to be a great year for a shareholder of Olam. That huge spike you see there in Mar-2014 was when Teamsek came in with an offer price of S$2.23 per share which has appeared to provide some sort of a support for their price.

 

2. Thai Beverage Public Company Limited (SGX:Y92)

For Thai Beverage’s case, their increase although wasn’t as spectacular as Olam, it was still very much in the mid-twenties range of 26% without accounting for dividends.

Many know of Thai Beverage as the producer of Chang Beer, but they also have a huge portfolio of other alcoholic to non-alcoholic beverages!

Thai Beverage made the headlines back in 2013 with the victorious bid by Charoen Sirivadhanabhakdior for one of Southeast Asia’s largest takeover of the Singapore conglomerate Fraser & Neave or more commonly known as F&N.

 

3. ComfortDelGro Corporation Limited (SGX:C52)

The final one to the party was none other than ComfortDelGro – one of the largest land based transportation company in the world. ComforDelGro had capital gains of 27% coupled with dividend yield (Based on Jan 2, price of S$2.02 per share) of 4% totalling 31%! A fundamental rationale behind the surge ComfortDelGro’s increase would be a potential regulatory change to both its rail and bus operations which would result in them potentially becoming purely an operator and earn a margin above cost! Another possible catalyst might also be the recent plummet in crude oil prices which could result in lower operating expenses for ComfortDelGro.

 

Value In Action

Who says ‘boring’ companies don’t give you exciting rewards! Many of us might expect the ‘sexier’ companies to take the cake but 2014 had instead been a good year for the ‘boring’ businesses.

To end off, we hope that 2014 has been good for you and we hope for an even better 2015! Cheers 😀

 

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We will only provide you with information relevant to value investing. You can unsubscribe at any time. Your contact details will be safeguarded.The information provided is for general information purposes only and is not intended to be any investment or financial advice.

All views and opinions articulated in the article were expressed in Mun Hong’s personal capacity and do not in any way represent those of his employer and other related entities. Mun Hong does not own any shares in the companies mentioned above.

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