How I Diversified into Foreign Assets for Massive Growth

When it comes to investing and building a lasting wealth, professional investors advise that you spread your money around different assets classes – that is, “diversify” your investment. Why? because it’s often believed that diversification protects you from losing all your money during market swings.

Besides, the pending devaluation of our local currency against major foreign currencies means that your investment in Naira denominated assets alone – stock, properties, or bond – may expose you to the high risk of putting your eggs in one basket. Just recently, it was all over the major newspaper headlines that the CBN might float the Naira; what this means is that the exchange of USD to Naira will be determined by market forces with economic analysts predicting a potential double-digit growth in the price of essential commodities, this was eventually tamed by the regulatory body.

My question is, what if it was true? whether you own stocks, treasury bill, bond, or real estate, as long as your assets are in Naira, your portfolio would have lost value relative to the USD.

Having a lot of investments doesn’t mean diversifications, you need to understand the least talked about categories of diversifications beyond equities, real estate, and fixed income securities. This is diversifications away from local currency assets to the US dollar-denominated assets.

As Nigeria economic risk worsens, it makes more sense to suggest foreign assets diversifications; where one diversifies and build short or long term foreign currency portfolio.

4 reasons I diversified into US dollar portfolio:

If you want to know why putting your money into foreign currency assets matters, there are interesting reasons:

Continue reading How I Diversified into Foreign Assets for Massive Growth

How Rule of 72 Can Help You Invest & Retire With More Cash

As a rational investor looking for a low-risk retirement and investing ideas that work in Nigeria, have you ever considered investment options based on the potentials to double your cash? This is exactly why I am sharing the number-based investing tip called “Rule of 72”.

The Rule of 72 is a straightforward computation used by financial analyst to estimate how long your money will double based on what you currently earn on your present investment. It’s that simple! To compute it, just divide your expected return on treasury bills, bond, fixed deposit or equities investment by 72. The end result is the number of years, month or days it will take you to multiply your money by 2.

As a young and growing investor, I always look at this number to select the best investment while considering the potential of capital loss too.

Rule of 72 may not be the perfect maths but I think its an investing concept you can easily adopt without punching calculators; you can do the calculation in your head. Let’s say you expect to earn 11% annual return on your CBN Treasury bill, the Rule of 72 lets you see that it takes 6 years and some month to double your money – this makes the idea worth paying attention to.

investment ideas in nigeria

Continue reading How Rule of 72 Can Help You Invest & Retire With More Cash

How I Make Money from US Stocks – See Screenshots

The opportunity that I’m about to share with you could be the surest information you need to diversify and profit from the US stock market, week on week or month on month. In fact, it’s so profitable that I bet big on a stock using other people’s money – you are strongly advised to start with your own money.

If you are familiar with stock trading, you should know that capital appreciation is the most sort after strategies to multiplying your money in the market; this method requires one to pick a stock he or she thinks is undervalued relative to its fair value, buy at a low price and wait for an increase.

This idea works on every market, developing and emerging stock market. Unfortunately, we have experienced the opposite in the Nigeria stock market in the last 12 months. As of this update, my overall return on investment in the market is in the negative territory (-12%) with further downside expected; no thanks to the FGN and CBN’s never-ending unpredictable policies and political uncertainties.

In order to cut down overall losses on my combined equity portfolio, I have doubled-down on foreign equities (US stocks) by sourcing additional funds from some of my close friends, selected blog subscribers so that I can take advantage of the cash margin offered by my US stockbroker.

As of this update, I have closed 10 winning trades with each netting me an average of 20% return. I settled for a moderate 20% return so that I can easily compound my returns in 6 months to 1 year.

Here is a screenshot of my US stock brokerage account showing 2 of the 10 winning trades in my account history:

This stock market profits were boosted by margin trades; leverage that lets you borrow money from your stockbroker so you can buy more shares with less. For instance, if you opt for 1:5, it means you can use 5x whatever you are investing in the stock market. Let’s say you invested $200, it means you can buy $1,000 worth of shares in a company and if the price goes up by 10%, you will earn 50% return on your money or vice versa.

I don’t advise anyone to start trading US stocks like this unlike you have mastered the profit system I discussed in my video training.

Continue reading How I Make Money from US Stocks – See Screenshots

3 Reasons You Should Trade US Stocks & How to Start

The US stock market is dubbed the largest and most liquid exchange in the world with a market capitalization comfortably sitting above $50 billion. The exchange “houses” some of the best, finest and fast-growing global brands across different sectors like consumer, energy, financials, health care, industrial, IT, materials, real estate, telcos, and utilities.

Beyond the sectors mentioned, the US stock market also offers a variety of fund and ETF listings that reflects different categories of assets exposures one can think of; oil, gold, currencies, emerging markets, treasuries/bond up to cryptos. This means that whatever asset classes you may be interested in gaining exposure to, you can leverage on these diverse options to build foreign currency portfolio away from the Naira.

While investors are encouraged to invest in their local market so that indigenous companies will easily access capital for expansion, I strongly believe that the unique opportunities in the US stock exchanges are strong reasons one should diversify or hedge against the risk of single currency investments:

1. When you buy U.S.-listed securities… you’re buying the world

A larger percentage of the annual revenues generated by companies listed on the NYSE, NASDAQ, and AMEX actually come from outside the U.S. In 2018, an average of 52% of the sales posted by the top 500-listed companies ( S&P 500 index) didn’t come from the U.S. Well, you already know that a good number of companies listed in the US stock market are actually foreign companies – The reason the choose U.S. exchange is because that’s where the real money is.

Continue reading 3 Reasons You Should Trade US Stocks & How to Start

The 3 Indicators I Use to Accurately Predict Bitcoin & Etherum Prices

This guide contains my best technical indicators for cryptocurrency trading – copy the tools I use to accurately predict Bitcoin and Etherum – before their prices went up further by 50% after I bought at $6,300 on the Luno platform.

I have been trading Bitcoin and Etherum actively in the past 3-4 months after a friend encouraged me to re-try the cryptocurrency market. He believed that my good use of technical analysis in the stock market would help me spot trade opportunities more in the crypto-currency market.

Since then, I have generated over 50% profit trading Bitcoin and Etherum. My decision to trade Bitcoin and Etherum isn’t unconnected to the fact that they occupy a larger portion of the cryptocurrency market value and most widely followed by top crypto analyst and financial news websites.

This isn’t my first time of trading cryptocurrencies but was discouraged when I had issues with some of the Nigeria exchanges.

I trade these two cryptocurrencies on the Luno platform via my mobile app, a simple intuitive user-friendly mobile exchange that makes it easy for me to fund my wallet in Naira, then initiate exchange to Bitcoin or Etherum at the current market price with instant execution. On the Luno platform, you fund your verified account with Paystack or PayU payment solutions.

As a technical trader in the stock market, here are the 3 powerful technical indicators I deployed to spot trends in the cryptocurrency market using Bitcoin as a case study.

  • 21/55-Day Moving Average

This indicator measures the average price of Bitcoin for a specific period of time. I use 21 and 55 simple moving averages to spot market trend; whether it is bullish or bearish. While the 55-day MA tells me how the crypto is trending in the last 3 month, the 21-day MA follows market performance in the last one (1) month.

Continue reading The 3 Indicators I Use to Accurately Predict Bitcoin & Etherum Prices

2 Growth Stocks You Can’t Afford to Miss in 2019

While the NSE all share index has been more volatility lately compared to their counterparts in emerging markets, I still believe that there is still short to medium term growth potential for a patient, risk-tolerant investors that pick stocks at the bottom before they rally.

One key secret of such investor is that they no longer wait for final results before picking actual stocks to buy but uses “growth numbers posted on the first quarter, to spot growth stocks that are already on track to beat previous full year’s result“, then buy ahead of the anticipated market rush.

Today, I have picked two (2) sure stocks you can buy on dip and are clearly on track to deliver better than expected result in 2019.

Chams Plc

Chams PLC offers smartcard technologies. The Company offers a public access retail billing and collection system with Internet access. Chams also offer home office products.

Last year, the technology stock broke its record of a 3-year consecutive loss as its reported a profit after tax of N380m, a 131% growth compared to a loss of N1.26b declared in 2017. Interestingly, this is the highest profit posted by the company in 5 years.

The highlight of Chams’ financials in the previous full year shows that sales grew from N1.9b to N3 (57%), while the cost of sales expanded by 83% but didn’t deter the company from posting a high gross profit of  N785m compared to N742m.

A reduction in administrative expenses and write back of VAT provisions contributed to the company’s shift to positive territory, from an operating loss of N1.2b to a profit of N31m.  With shareholders equity of N1.95b, return in equity for the year was 19.4% compared to a loss.

Chams plc has also proved that the growth in the previous year’s result could be sustained as it reported an impressive Q1 2019 result.

Continue reading 2 Growth Stocks You Can’t Afford to Miss in 2019

At What Price Will CCNN Stock Turnaround?

Nothing puts a smile on one’s face like a high- flying growth stock. Not only will stock in your portfolio that has returned 100%, 200% or even 500% help you build wealth faster but it also makes up for several losing stocks.

While this makes high-growth stock appealing, how can one spot such an opportunity before others? Amongst several strategies shared by top investment analyst, turnaround stock trading strategy seems to be the most rewarding of all.

What is a turnaround stock strategy?

In simple term, turnaround strategy picks temporarily out-of-favour stocks with upside profit potential. Of course, not all bearish companies offer potential turnaround opportunity, but this investing principle believes that bearish stocks with real value will always prevail regardless of the stock’s setback.

In the NSE market, one of the stocks that have been trending down week on week and has got everyone asking questions after a significant decline in EPS to 44k from N2.57 is Cement Company of Northern Nigeria (CCNN).

The company is engaged in the production and marketing of cement under the brand name “Sokoto Cement”.

In its latest financial results, the stock recorded an 82.7% fall in distributable earnings following a merger arrangement with Kalambaina Cement Company Limited 2018. Since FY2018 was released, the stock has lost up to 30% of its market value and might shed more as investors price in expected full year’s EPS for 2019 (based on 13.1 ordinary shares outstanding compared to pre-merger shares of 1.2b).

As of this analysis, CCNN stock trades for N14, 56% down from its 52-weeks high of N32.At the current market price, this may not be a stock to trade now but it does offer real value that could reward smart investors who key in at a bottom price.

Here are some key metrics that support the fundamentals of CCNN:

Continue reading At What Price Will CCNN Stock Turnaround?

Is The New Access Bank Destined for Greatness?

Investors love banking stocks that beat the market index without getting ahead of its financials or risking sell-off on overvaluation. In this financial analysis, we looked at the new Access bank, short term chart analysis, and basic banking metrics to check if the recent financials support strong price growth.

What we’re looking for?

We will be looking at key areas like:

  • Net Interest and Profit After Tax
  • Efficiency
  • Return on Equity
  • Customers’ Deposit
  • Book Value Per Share

In the bank’s recent result, Access bank reported a significant growth in net interest income to N53b (from N39.6b in the previous first comparable quarter). This was largely boosted by interest on investment securities which grew by 227%.

This growth at the top level, coupled with the net gain of N6b on foreign exchange transaction, were supportive of the 86% growth in profit after tax to N41b.

On the efficiency level, a key metric that tells how the bank is able to manage its operating expenses. Access bank efficiency ratio prints at 54.6%, down from 55.7%. While this is below the industry standard of 60%, the bank needs to cut a chunk of its operating expenses to rank at per with its peer.

Return on Equity, a measure of how the bank utilised shareholder’s fund, prints at 7.1% compared with 4.5% reported in the previous quarter. This represents a 57% growth Q on Q.

Customer deposit from the newly merged entity also grew by 35% to N4.6tr which is a form of cheap money (that comes with lower interest expenses) expected to generate higher earnings from an investment in fixed income market.

The customer deposit to liability ratio, a key measure of how the bank generates cheap money is 79%, a slight increase from 77% reported in Q1 2018. The significance of higher deposit/liability to a bank is that it tends to pay lower interest on savings/term deposit compared to interest on debt instruments like commercial paper, and Eurobond.

Since we can’t ascertain the full year’s earning with the first quarter result, it makes sense to use the net asset valuation approach to estimate the value of the bank’s stock. An asset-based approach identifies a company’s net assets by subtracting liabilities from assets. The asset-based valuation is often adjusted to calculate the net asset value of a company based on the market value of its assets and liabilities.

Continue reading Is The New Access Bank Destined for Greatness?

Here is Everything You Should Know About FGN Savings Bond

How to Invest in FGN Bonds in Nigeria – Everything You Should Know About FGN Savings Interest Rates & Current Yields Including How it Works and Get Started

If you have been receiving emails from your stockbrokers on latest FGN savings bond but don’t understand bond as a fixed income investment, here is a simple explanation and detailed guide on how it works, including steps to invest in FGN bond.

FGN Bond is a bond issued by the Nigerian government in exchange for cash at a given interest rate and a repayment period. It also states how payments of the principal and interest will be made. A bond is a confirmation from a borrower that it borrowed money from a lender at a given interest rate and repayable over a period. They also include a minimum amount that can be subscribed to by the lender and in what multiples.

The FGN bond is a major source of finance for capital projects; otherwise known as longterm infrastructural investments. This is the reason bond tenors span for up to 20 – 30 years.

Why you should invest in FGN savings bond

When you invest in the FGN bond, you earn a passive interest income that will be paid quarterly directly into your savings or current bank account. Interestingly, you really do not need to have millions in your bank account to invest as anyone with as little as N5,000 can invest in the bond.

Continue reading Here is Everything You Should Know About FGN Savings Bond

3 Things to Do if You’re in your 40 With No Passive Income

How to Plan your Retirements in your 40s – Learn How to Save, Use the Passive Income Ideas to Invest and Build Wealth for your Family.

Aside from your voluntary retirement savings and contributions to Pension account, everyone is supposed to invest independently for passive income before one clocks 40. While this advice also applies to the 20s, 30s are considered the most appropriate time because it is the period one should aggressively build and own potential lifetime passive income assets.

When you clock 40, you ought to have moved from earning a salary to investing and from investing to generating a sizable passive income that will take care of you and your family.

The question is how much is considered a passive income? Well, there is no single exact figure to consider a passive income but I always think that if everyone has an idea of his/her monthly/annual living expenses, then one can work towards building an asset that generates a cash flow that covers these expenses with extra savings, this, in my definition, is what my definition of passive income.

For instance, if your family expenses on a monthly basis are between N100,000 – N150,000, (which translates to N1,200,000 annually), a true annual passive income, say N1,400,000 should cover these monthly expenses with extra cash savings.

Now if you are in your 20s or even 30s, you have enough time to start building your investment portfolio or asset for passive income. But if you are already above 40, that window may become narrower especially for the late 40s.

Continue reading 3 Things to Do if You’re in your 40 With No Passive Income

Is It Worth Buying Stanbic IBTC Despite Higher Prices?

Among the three banks trading above N20 per share and have released their 2018 full year’s result, Stanbic IBTC bags the most impressive bottom line figure having recorded a significant increase in profit after tax and EPS to N74 billion (from N48b) and N7.04 (from N4.6), representing a high double-digit growth of 54% and 53% respectively. Not only is the bank doing a great job of maintaining its market share in its core investment banking business, and generating a better than expected non-interest revenue in a tough environment but also growing shareholders’ wealth.

The question now is, How is Stanbic IBTC able to grow her earnings faster? 

Let us look at the performance of the bank in the last 4 years, 2015 – 2018 period.

Source: Financial Statement 2015 and 2016

Source: Financial Statement 2017 and 2018

Revenue

The bank’s gross earnings grew from N140b in 2015 to N222b representing 12.22% average annual growth in 4 years. This is largely driven by non-interest revenue which went up by an average of 16.17% year on year (from N56b in the last 4 years to N102b).

Interest income is also growing by an average of 16.05%.

We know that banks make money by lending at a higher rate than what they pay to depositors. Banks collect interest (the money a borrower pays for the ability to use the bank’s money) on loans and pay interest (the money a bank pays depositors for allowing their money to be held). The difference between these two rates is known as net interest margin (or ‘the spread’) and is how traditional banks make money.

Stanbic IBTC net interest margin, a measure of the bank’s profit on its interest-generating assets, is still well above the industry standard of 4%, 8% (2015), 9.3% (2016), 11.9% (2017) and 9.2% (2018). Based on its 4 years of history, it has an average margin of 9.6%.

Continue reading Is It Worth Buying Stanbic IBTC Despite Higher Prices?

4 Short-Term Investment Apps That Offer Higher Interest Rates Than Your Bank

Best Investment Apps in Nigeria – Earn Higher Interest Rates Returns Than Your Bank Fixed Deposit Accounts – Best Short-Term Investment Opportunities for Salary Earners.

I have some cash I will like to save and hold for 6-12 months but don’t want to keep it in my savings account, what are the risk-free options I can explore to earn a high-interest return above my conventional savings account rate of 2-3%? 

If you have asked a similar question, and are still looking for the best answer, this is for you, pay attention to the information shared, this might be one of your best short term investment guides this year.

We already know that the interest on a savings account is low to the extent that they can’t keep pace with inflation (now at 11.3% as of this update), so your money loses value over time.

For some of us that don’t know how money loses value every year, Let me share a practical example of how a typical N100,000 was worth more 3-5 years ago than it is right now.

We will compare savings returns when the average inflation rate as of 2013 was 8.5% and the latest 2019 figure of 11.3%.

Assuming you kept N100,000 in the bank in a savings account which earned 3% per annum in 2013. The real value of your money isn’t N103,000 at the end of the year but N94,000 (1+3%/1+8.5%). In Finance, we call this inflation-adjusted return.

Fast forward to 2019, the same N100,000 in a savings account that offers the same return of 3% after adjusting for a high inflation rate at 11.3% will be worth N92,000 (1+3%/1.11.3%).

You see how Inflation eats away the value of every stream of cash flow, including salaries, and pension. Although, you will get the same nominal value of N100,000 or N103,000 (interest included) the value of what you can buy with it has reduced from N94,000 to N92,000, down by 2% and that is how your cash savings lose an average of 2% of its value year on year.

Continue reading 4 Short-Term Investment Apps That Offer Higher Interest Rates Than Your Bank

Will the NSE All Share Index Rebound Next Week?

The 2019 presidential election is over with the incumbent president emerging after polling 15.19 million votes to defeat Atiku Abubakar, his key opposition. The result has however been rejected by the opposition party citing violence in some areas and election malpractices.

Is this a sign of another political uncertainties? 

Investors have also reacted negatively to the uncertainties surrounding this development as the NSE All Share Index failed to break 33,000 basis point, rather went opposite direction to close the week at 31, 827.24 with the year to data return inching close to the negative territory, now at 1.92%.

Similarly, all other indices finished lower with the exception of the NSE Insurance and NSE Industrial Goods indices which rose by 3.01% and 0.93% respectively while the NSE ASeM index closed flat.

Let us analyse the NSE All Share Index Chart:

Continue reading Will the NSE All Share Index Rebound Next Week?

How Re-Investing Your Dividend Will Multiply Your Wealth Faster

How to Build Wealth in the Stock Market (in your 20s and 30s) – The Secret to Plan, Retire and Double Your Stock Market Portfolio Faster.

When it comes to building wealth in the stock market, dividend investing is the least loved of the strategies practised. This is not far from the fact that the reward is small compared to the attractive and quick gain on share price appreciations which can come in days, weeks or months. Well, that is about to change as this guide will not only teach you strategies to picking dividend stocks and earn above CBN T-Bill rates but also strengthen and help you understand key secrets to generate a regular passive six-figure dividend income in a bearish and bullish market.

Continue reading How Re-Investing Your Dividend Will Multiply Your Wealth Faster

Why Shares of Oando is Rising Amidst Huge Debt.

The price of Oando stock has been trending higher in the last 6 days, a bullish run with no recent corporate announcements. As of this analysis, the oil stock trade for N7.25, up by 9.85% in today’s trading session with YTD return now at 45%.

Let us look at the performance of the stock on a chart and analyse the trend of the stock for short term traders who might want to buy at the current market price.

On the chart above, I added the 50-day simple moving average (SMA) to gauge market sentiment towards the oil stock. Between November 2018 and December 2018, Oando stock was resisted at the 50-day line; each time the stock trend close to average, it turned bearish. (as indicated by A, B, C and D) But, notice how that same 50-day SMA rejection (which would have occurred at the region marked E ) was broken as the price went up through the resistance with a stronger run from N4.76 (and cross above the 200-day SMA) to N7.25, 52%.

Continue reading Why Shares of Oando is Rising Amidst Huge Debt.

Where to Invest your Money & Earn Multiple Streams of Passive Income

Where to Invest your Money in Nigeria for Passive Income – High Yield Short and Long Term Financial Investment Opportunities in Real Estate and Property Development, Dividend Stocks, Treasury Bills, Fixed Deposits & Mutual Funds

Mike, a business consultant in an IT firm, often wondered how his closest colleague, Efe who was on the same executive level, with the same annual benefits and who also had the same skill and working experience could afford to migrate from his place of resident to a decent place at Lekki, buy a new Toyota Camry and even take his wife on a trip to some of the best places in Lagos and Abuja while he (Efe) was still struggling to make efficient use of his monthly pay and have some to save in a savings account.

Mike has been very smart about how we could use his salary to generate passive or side income. He didn’t just save his monthly earnings in a fixed deposit account, that earns a low-digit interest return while his money is lent to qualified corporate borrowers at a higher rate, but explored some double-digit interest return opportunities  only a few know in Nigeria, with the extra cash flow credited to his account month on month, quarter on quarter and year on year, he is on his way to achieving a total freedom from salaried job or monthly paycheck while securing his kid’s education and family’s fortune.

Continue reading Where to Invest your Money & Earn Multiple Streams of Passive Income

Will NSE Index Go Up or Down After Election? Here a Technical Analysis

The NSE Index has recorded impressive appreciation. On a year-to-date basis, the index is up by 3.45% as investors take positions on stocks believed to be undervalued ahead of year-end results.

As of this analysis, the market closed the session at 32,515.52 basis point, down by 0.16%. Interestingly, this is the last trading day before Nigerians decide on who leads the country in the next 4 years.

Let us first look at a weekly performance of the index.

The NSE All-Share Index and Market Capitalization depreciated by 0.61% to close the week at 32,515.52 and 12.126 trillion respectively. Similarly, all other indices finished lower with the exception of the NSE ASem, NSE Banking, NSE Insurance NSE-AFR Bank Value and NSE Oil/Gas indices which rose by 0.96%, 0.68%, 0.02%
0.95% and 0.13% respectively.

Continue reading Will NSE Index Go Up or Down After Election? Here a Technical Analysis

Why Fidelity Stock Price Rally May Attract More Buyers to FCMB.

A few weeks ago, I alerted everyone on Fidelity bank, why the banking stock is still cheap at N2.38 and went on to share my technical and fundamental reasons you should quickly jump on the penny stock.  In line with my forecast, the stock did rally by 17% to N2.80 before reversing the 6 days bullish run to settle at N2.46.

While I still anticipate further upswing close to my estimated fair value on the release of the bank’s full-year result, we advise that you remain cautious by considering a 25-30% exit price of N2.9-N3.

Here is Fidelity stock’s Chart:

Based on the chart above, Fidelity might be set for another rally as evident by the bullish pin bar formation at N2.34 – N2.4 support level. The bank had already surpassed its 9-months figure in its previous comparable period (2017) and is expected to release better full year’s figures.

How does this translate to a buying opportunity on FCMB stock, you may ask?

Both banks, as of this analysis, have the same trailing twelve month EPS of 77k which when discounted by a modest adjusted risk premium rate of 19%, presents a fair value of N3.8 – N4.05. FCMB stock sells for N2.27 far behind Fidelity bank’s stock (N2.46).

Interestingly, FCMB formed a golden crossover today. Find more information on how I trade the golden crossover.

Continue reading Why Fidelity Stock Price Rally May Attract More Buyers to FCMB.