Goal Review in February 2015

1. Read 2 chapters of bible every day.
I managed to read 2 chapters of bible almost every day. There was 1 day I missed, so I gave myself a 96% for this month. I learnt a lot reading the Book of Kings and Chronicles. The bible taught me the valuable lessons from the Israel and Judah kings' life that led to their rise and fall.

2. Exercise 4 x 45 minutes every week.
I wasn't able to keep up my exercise routine during the Chinese New Year holiday. Nevertheless, I didn't regret as I was spending quality time with my mum and my family. This month I only kept my 80% of my exercise target.

3. Reduce my weight by 5 kg, from 78.5 kg to 73.5 kg.
My weight was going up and down like a yoyo. With less exercise and lot of temptation (Chinese New Year snack, bak kwa, etc), I was gaining some weight back. Fortunately I managed to end February weighing at 77.1 kg, reducing another 0.4 kg compared to January. I gave myself 80% for this goal achievement in February.

4. Save $90K, and use the fund to grow my investment portfolio from $265K to $355K.
I spent more than what I earned. With all the gifts and ang paos for relatives, and a trip planned to visit my 80+ year old grand auntie in Taiwan in March, I was expecting negative savings for January and February.

I didn't expect myself to be able to save and make new contribution to my investment portfolio until late March or early April, My next contribution will be channeled to build a new portfolio consisting of low cost index and dividend stocks.

YTD, I only fulfilled 5.56% of the total target for new contributions, no changes from January.

5. Achieve 4% return on my investment on average weighted basis.
I really didn't expect to repeat the January performance in February. But alas, I was wrong and February turned to be another good month. My portfolio returned 3.28% YTD (20.67% annualized).
Because I'm still on track to achieve 4% return for this year, I gave myself 100% for this goal.

While equity market was bullish in February, I took the opportunity to reduce my equity funds and re-balanced it to bond, high yield, and short duration bond funds. On a hindsight, this was probably the right move with Dow losing almost 300 points last week. It felt "shiok" seeing blood with only 20% of the portfolio in equity.