Tag: Art

Investment fears: 5 ways to deal with them

The main reason you are always skeptical about investment is uncertainty. Remember in the past when you were presented with some investment opportunities, you turned them down because you were afraid of taking the risk.

It is not a big deal to fear uncertainties, after all, as human beings; we are not empowered to know what tomorrow will look like, we can only project. it is very important for you to yank off your fear and invest today so your tomorrow can look good. So, if you are ready to face tomorrow, below are a few tips on how you can overcome your fear of investment:

Get Information from Experts

Knowledge is power. Sometimes unconfirmed reports by people who do not understand investment may get to you, thereby creating doubt in your mind about it.  But you can choose to be fortified with deep investment knowledge and insight from investment advisers who will guide you and advise you on the best ways to invest your money.

Look Beyond the Moment

When a farmer plants a seed, he or she does not expect to harvest it that same day. Investment is just like a seed which must be given much time to grow and multiply. So, when you are thinking of investing, look beyond the present and see a future where your investment would have grown in multiples.

 Take A Step

Investment is about taking a well-calculated risk. It is even riskier when you don’t take it.

Renowned Digital Marketing guru Neil Patel once said that one mistake he regrets daily in his life is not investing in Airbnb years ago when he was presented with the opportunity to do so. Then, Airbnb was just a small startup operating from a room apartment. Now, Airbnb has grown to become a multi-billion-dollar company.

When investment opportunities come your way and there are good indices that show that it will be profitable, trust your gut and don’t hesitate.

 Start Small, Grow Bigger Later

Starting small is the best way to go when it comes to investment. You can start with little money and grow it when you start seeing a positive result and your confidence will get better.

Don’t forget that in investment, the bigger your money, the higher your return on investment, this makes it ideal not to stay too long in the confine of small investment, you must expand.

Use trusted Investment Managers

When you have finally overcome your fears and ready to explore the financial opportunities in form of investment, it is very important to ask for the services of a trusted and reputable investment manager such as ARM Investment Managers. We have been helping people to manage their investments for over 24 years by using our expertise, experience and deep knowledge of Nigeria’s investment clime.

One of our investment packages that guarantees return on investment that you can explore is ARM Mutual funds Regardless of your risk appetite or investment goal, you’ll find a mutual fund that suits you just fine. Mutual funds typically pool funds from multiple investors and invest in verifiable instruments such as government bonds.

If you would like to know more about how you can invest in ARM Mutual Funds, please click here

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5 ways to survive a lean purse after paying school fees

This is the month of paying school fees and of course paying more since your child must have moved to a new class. Seeing how school fee rates spike and new activities that gulp finances keep getting introduced in school curricula, it will be no surprise to see that your account balance will feel the burden after school fees payment – especially if you didn’t start investing towards it earlier.

We feel your pain. See how you can still survive through the month until the next payday:

Cut down on household expenses

There must be some way you can reduce your spending on household items. It could be by buying in bulk, buying one kind of cereal as opposed to three – get creative with figuring out how to shrink your list.

Limit hangouts

If you usually hang out on weekends with the boys/girls where you spend money, knowing how lean your pocket is at the moment, it will be wise to take a rain check this month. The party can resume in October, but of course with you spending wisely.

Eat in/Pack your own food

When you make your own food, you spend less than you would if you were buying out. This month, as you have spent the bulk of your finances on school fees, you should consider cooking your own food and packing it to work. That way, you greatly reduce expenses.

Prioritize

Now is the time to clearly differentiate between what you or your children want to have and what you need to have. When you identify this, cautiously approach when and how you get them bearing in mind how much you have available.

Don’t borrow

Don’t do it! Debt has a way of catching you by the neck when you least expect it. Focus on how to judiciously manage what you have until your next salary comes.

Now, this is not an all exhaustive list of how to pull through this month, but it’s a good place to start.

Remember, you can avoid being in this situation when the next school fees payment comes in January by simply investing monthly in the ARM  Money Market Fund instrument.

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Will he?

The scene showed Baba Folu shouting at Iya Folu. He couldn’t understand why she would even suggest that he should write a will. At 56, this woman seems to think he is headed for a reunion with his ancestors.

Franca sighed and turned to her husband Dan. “Darling, please change this channel. Why the man is being unreasonable is beyond me.” But her husband stares at her in disbelief.

“Hold on Fran, are you saying you agree with the woman? I mean, who writes a will unless they know they’re ready to die?”. Franca’s mouth opens in shock. With all his education, how could her husband of 8 years think like this?

“Darling, a will is not a preparatory rite of passage but a contingency plan for the people you love who in this case will be I, the kids and your immediate family. Now that we’re on this topic, you and I should consider writing our will too.”

But her last words were said to an empty room. Dan had walked away angrily.

This action got her worried and puzzled. If Dan wasn’t willing to do something to protect the children, she would. Maybe this is a sign. Perhaps it’s time to write a will for her children’s sake.

With that decision, Franca began to list her assets. RSA account, the land she bought with her savings and 13^th month salary her first year working, her car, jewelries, bank accounts, Money Market Fund account and her hair business.

After making the list, she considered how to proceed. Then she remembered the Easy Will discussion on the radio the previous week on how using the portal, anyone could easily write their will from the comfort of their home. Quickly, she brought out her laptop and instinctively looked at the clock. 12 am it showed. Time to take little Sarah out to pee.

She dropped the laptop and went to pick Sarah up. One look at her three children as they slept peacefully, and her resolve to complete the process of writing her Will got stronger.

Two minutes later, she was back to the task at hand. Before 1am, she had successfully completed her will and had it sent to her email for signing.

She would print the Will and sign it tomorrow, she thought. Packed up and ready to call it a night, Franca experienced a strange peace. One she knew Dan would appreciate as well if he took this step. Franca knew her husband well. He loved his family too much and would succumb when he sees a Will is more for their protection than a death sentence for him.

She’ll try explaining to him again after three days, she thought as sleep stole her consciousness.

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Nigerian Inflation: Approaching an Inflection point

Executive Summary 

In our H1 18 strategy report, we projected a drop-in headline inflation, anchored on the blend of soft domestic food prices and base-effects (H1 17) with the scale of moderation trimmed by higher transport inflation – hinged on rising crude oil prices. Indeed, our view of a downturn in consumer prices panned out with headline inflation declining by 285bps over H1 18 to average 13.02% year-on-year (YoY).

However, the scale of moderation was steeper than what we had envisaged, as NNPC stepped up its fuel imports over the period to support market supply and price – at N145/litre. Consequently, core inflation dipped 101bps to average 11.17% YoY over H2 17 while food inflation declined markedly by 451bps over the review period to 15.63% YoY with the sharp decrease resulting from the impact of favorable base effect and increased market supplies.

In terms of our outlook over the second half of the year, we considered currency and liquidity concerns over the rest of the year. On the currency front, we believe increased interventions from the CBN will keep the Naira stable in H2 18. With regard to liquidity, particularly from the implementation of the approved 2018 budget (N9.12 trillion) and, most importantly, spending against the 2019 elections, we do not envisage any price pressure, taking a cue from precedents which shows muted pressures over H2 18 as well as in the months leading up to elections.

Overall, our analysis suggests that while base effects although minimal would drive lower CPI, structural bottlenecks from elevated transportation costs should limit scale of moderation in inflation. Summing up developments across both core and food inflation sub-components, we project mean headline inflation to hover around 12.04% YoY over 2018 (2017: 16.55%).

Headline inflation nose-dives over H1 2018, hits 28-month low

In our H1 18 strategy report, we projected a drop-in headline inflation with downside curtailed by elevated transport inflation. Precisely, our expectation of softer inflation was anchored on the blend of soft domestic food prices and base-effects (H1 17) with the scale of moderation trimmed by higher transport inflation, hinged on higher crude oil prices.

Indeed, our view of a downturn in consumer prices panned out with headline inflation declining by 285bps over H1 18 to average 13.02% year-on-year (YoY). However, the scale of moderation was steeper than what we had envisaged. To be precise, due to rising crude oil prices, we had expected independent marketers’ inability to import fuel to give rise to episodes of fuel scarcity which would pressure PMS price.

However, in a bid to boost supply, NNPC stepped up its fuel imports over the period thus supporting price at regulated level of N145/litre. Consequently, core inflation dipped 101bps to average 11.17% YoY over H2 17 with the decline stemming from the HWEGF1, education and clothing divisions. In the review period, food inflation declined markedly by 451bps to 15.63% YoY with the sharp decrease resulting from the impact of favorable base effect and increased market supplies.

VIEW FULL REPORT HERE

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Source: Articles

ECONOMIC UPDATE: Currency – The Battle for Naira Stability

In our H1 18 Nigeria Strategy Report, we projected a blow in FX outflows that will impulse the CBN to step up its intervention across FX markets. Our projection was based on the confluence of policy normalization in developed markets, flight to safety across EMs, lower domestic interest rate environment, and political risk in the domestic clime. True to our prognosis, average monthly FX outflows rose 15.4% over H1 2018 to $3.6 billion (forecast; $3.3 billion), which prompted an accelerated pace of intervention by the CBN.

For context, CBN sales expanded at the IEW1 and interbank markets over H1 18 – IEW (+122% to $1.96 billion), BDC (+83% to $2.89 billion) and Interbank sales (+56% to $11.4 billion) to drive overall intervention to $16.3 billion (+66.5%). Consequently, the NAFEX2 and BDC rates remained relatively stable over H1 18, closing the period at N360.5/$1 and N362.3/$1 accordingly.

Coalescing our adjusted CBN outflows and inflows, we estimate monthly average reserve drawdown of $310 million (average accretion of $1.3 billion in H1 18) which summed up to $1.9 billion over H2 18 (vs. $8.0 billion accretion in H1 18) – notwithstanding Eurobond issuance – which should dwarf any significant accretion in the foreign reserve to $45.7 billion. Consequently, we expect the apex bank to put its full ammunition to use to keep the Naira at current bands, which would maintain stability in the short term to keep the interbank at N361/$ for the rest of 2018.

Further down, the distortion of the free interplay of demand and supply at the IEW with the lag expected from CBN intervention – amidst pressure at other windows as in May 18 – would drive short-term volatility in rates and an eventual adjustment to our fundamental driven purchasing power parity estimate of between N391.17/$ to N402.48/$ (7-10% down-leg from current NAFEX rate of N361.00/$ at the end of June 2018).

CBN fires up as Hot Money lose steam 

In our H1 18 Nigeria Strategy Report, we projected a blow in FX outflows that will impulse the CBN to step up its intervention across FX markets. Our projection was based on the confluence of policy normalisation in developed markets, flight to safety across EMs, lower domestic interest rate environment, and political risk in the domestic clime. True to our prognosis, average monthly FX outflows rose 15.4% over H1 2018 to $3.6 billion (forecast; $3.3 billion), which prompted an accelerated pace of intervention by the CBN.

For context, CBN sales expanded at the IEW3 and interbank markets over H1 18 – IEW (+122% to $1.96 billion), BDC (+83% to $2.89 billion) and Interbank sales (+56% to $11.4 billion) to drive overall intervention to $16.3 billion (+66.5%). That said, while we had expected the accelerated sales to drive a drawdown in external reserve, the combination of strong foreign flows in the first quarter, which provided room for the CBN to shore up its reserve4, combined with Eurobond issuance earlier in February, and improved oil inflows (+20.6% to $9.0 billion) triggered robust net flows with $7.4 billion accretion striding the FX reserve to $47.8 billion at the end of H1 18. Consequently, the NAFEX5 and BDC rates remained relatively stable over H1 18, closing the period at N360.5/$1 and N362.3/$1 accordingly.

VIEW FULL REPORT HERE

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Source: Articles