September Update
September started off with a fairly irresponsible purchase, but when I saw this picture from a trusted guy and saw the asking price (below market) I simply could not resist:
I'm a sucker for knives (mostly kitchen knives), and it's the only area (together with watches) where I must admit I own significantly more stuff than I really need.
1 good kitchen knife and maybe 1 folding/survival/whatever knife is enough, instead I own:
- 3 main kitchen knives: a large and midsize Zwilling chef knives, ad a small japanese paring knife (moki long hunter)
- 3 outdoor knives: this Hinderer, a large Sebenza Insingo and a Fallkniven A1 for those who like these kind of things
Still, September was a good month financially, with a 70% SR (78% YTD) in spite of the fact that for the first time in 2019 I collected no passive income.
YTD dividends have covered about 2/3 of this year's living expenses, and about 50% of the average expenses of the last 4 years.
This has been an unexpectedly frugal year so far, mostly due to the absence of one offs and a renewed focus on reducing expenses.
Asset Snapshot
I figured I'll put down a couple info on my AA so that I can come back here in the future and check how stupid or smart I have been, for a textbook "outcome over process" analysis.
Split as of today is stocks 85%, cash/CD 15%. No bonds as I live in europe. I don't like the idea of foreign currency denominated bonds, and I think Euro yields are insane.
Stocks are 43% in Index ETFs, 57% in individual stocks.
Indexes are split about 70/30 Europe/Emerging
Individual stocks are tilted towards safe dividends (RDSA, BAT, French utilities, GSK, etc) but overall diversified by sector and geography across Europe (for tax reasons).
Total assets value is around 20 years of expenses (average of last 4 years).
I do not include the value of my small apartment in the NW calculation.
Work/Travels
My work travels brought me to Japan and Vietnam this month.
Wasn't able to do much visiting in Japan, but while in Osaka I managed to meet a friend of mine in a pork skewer restaurant that looked fantastic.
We decided to order randomly as the menu wasn't exactly gaijin-friendly
Reminder: the japanese eat EVERYTHING
While in Vietnam, I spent a couple days in Ho Chi Minh city (Saigon), again without much time for tourism.
It is incredible how different the cost of living is between the locals and the westernized areas.
I stayed at *random american hotel chain*, and prices for food were about the same as you would get in europe.
Then you head out, and this costs 30000 Vietnamese Dong (about $1.30), and it is DELICIOUS! (name is Pho Bo)
Of course, the looks of the place aren't exactly up to the standards of average tourist:
Last but not least, I had to spend a couple days in Hanoi, where I finally had a little time to decompress.
First, we had a fantastic mini-ERE meetup with fellow forumite slowtraveler and GF.
We had a great time and ate some fairly spectacular pizza (yes, pizza! One of my best friends is a pizzaiolo in Hanoi and we met at his place).
We had some great discussions, one in particular stuck in my mind for a while.
While I was raving about how it must be great for slowtraveler to be able to, well, slow travel across the globe thanks to having pulled the plug, he made a great observation about how, on the flipside, I'm being paid to do what I do.
So the takeaways for me were:
1- I must stop whining as I'm a lucky bastard
2- One of my best achievements in life has probably been to design a work path / career that matched very well with my personal interest.
Of course most of it was due to luck, as it almost always is the case with white males from a western democracy.
Then I was able to sneak a half day visit in the Ninh Binh area.
Pretty spectacular and made me want to come back for a vacation.
Have a great weekend everyone!