Mar '17 Portfolio Review and Some

In general, portfolio remains stable. Major sell transaction would be the 50% reduction in holdings for Soilbuild Reit. Reason being the business's exposure to the O&G industry as explained in my previous post. Booked a capital lost, but the dividends collected over the years kinda make it a wash.

Recycled the capital from the sale of Soilbuild into VIVA Trust. What i like about VIVA is its business parks properties. I like business parks. More big companies are moving their backend departments to business parks as it is a cheaper option compared to housing them in the CBD. I believe demand for business parks will be sustainable as supply for business parks is pretty low.

Another thing i like about VIVA is that more contributions will come in this quarter considering only "58% of total “white space” contributed to 4Q2016 income" but "94.9% of “white space” is committed". I like buying REITs with AEI nearing completion. 1 down side would be Mcdermott ()&G related company) will not be renewing its rent at jackson square when it expires in april. However, there is a rental guarantee protection till November 2019, and foxconn has already committed to take up 8 out of 31% of lettable space that will be vacated by Mcdermott. Nov 2019 is still a good 2.5 years later! 

Eagle eye readers will realise i added 2 rows of repeated counters. AIMS and VIVA. Im beginning to help my wife set up a dividend portfolio as well. Due to her work, she has difficulty buying shares. Will not try to explain more here. Our plan is to achieve enough passive income for her to become a full time house wife in the future when we have a kid. We kinda agree that it is important and only fair to the kid if he/she is raised by the parents and not send to infantcare right from the start. 

With regards to Ezra Holdings. Everything is finally starting to un-ravel. Its subsidiary ECS filed for chapter 11 in the US. Smart move. I did a brief reading on the chapter 11, it seems like a more benign move to take compare to the judicial management that SWIBER applied for. Apparently they also managed to secured 90mil USD for operational purposes. Money comes from Chiyoda and Subsea 7. When i read up on Subsea 7, it comes as a surprise that a direct competitor would actually fork out money to help a dying brother in the industry. What is the motive behind it? Only time will tell.

It seems like Ezra Holdings will also go down the Chapter 11 route. In the midst of the chaos, they created an Ezra Inc. Is that to allow them to file for Chapter 11? Maybe? Perhaps? Something is brewing.  

All these that is happening in the O&G industry are the main drivers why i decided to reduce my holdings for Soilbuild. It's true that the oil price is coming back up and stabilising, but it is not fast and furious enough for the effects to trickle down the food chain.  Only strongest will survive!