Something is wrong with the US economy.

https://www.zacks.com/stock/news/328942/verizon-aims-to-lower-costs-through-employee-retrenchment

If the US economy is doing as well as the statistics are showing, Verizon won't be retrenching so many employees (44,000).

When a US telecom company needs to retrench 44,000 employees, it is showing that the US economic growth won't be good in the future because the US telecom company cannot earn enough to support the massive employees.

The USA is good at spinning stories.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/chinese-spies-reportedly-listening-trump-230100646.html

The USA tapped on other leaders but it insisted that China tapped on its president.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jul/08/nsa-tapped-german-chancellery-decades-wikileaks-claims-merkel

What a joke!

The global semiconductor slowdown is permanent because of the USA's anti-china policies.

https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/stmicro-upholds-bullish-2018-growth-target-strong-automotive-064828277--finance.html

This global semiconductor slowdown is permanent as China switches to home-made chips.  This switch is caused by US refusal to sell chips to ZTE.

This slowdown for foreign semiconductor manufacturer will be permanent as China ramps up its home-made chips for its own devices.  Thereafter, China will export China chips to the world at cheaper prices.

A good example will be Huawei Kirin chips.  Huawei has learnt from the ZTE lesson and ramped up its own development of Kirin chips.  The Kirin 980 is the latest AI chips and will be production ready soon.  Huawei will start to export its Kirin chips after it can satisfy its own demands.

Other China titans like Xiaomi, Oppo, Lenovo, etc will also try to develop or ramp up their own chips so that they won't encounter the ZTE situation ever again.  In short, the US has propelled China to develop its own semiconductor industry.

Jumbo - Stock calls

Date	Analyst	Company	Last	Target	Call	Valuation
02/14/17	UOB Kay Hian	Jumbo	0.725	0.65	Hold	DCF
02/15/17	DBS Vickers	Jumbo	0.715	0.72	Hold	PER23x FY17
02/15/17	Kim Eng	Jumbo	0.715	0.75	Hold	DCF
03/27/17	Lim & Tan	Jumbo	0.705	0	Hold
03/28/17	UOB Kay Hian	Jumbo	0.695	0.67	Hold	DCF, Buy @ $0.61
05/16/17	DBS Vickers	Jumbo	0.655	0.72	Hold	PER23x FY17/18
05/16/17	Kim Eng	Jumbo	0.655	0.66	Hold	DCF
05/16/17	UOB Kay Hian	Jumbo	0.655	0.64	Hold	DCF, Buy @ $0.58
08/10/17	DBS Vickers	Jumbo	0.59	0.67	Hold	PER23x FY18
08/11/17	UOB Kay Hian	Jumbo	0.56	0.6	Hold	DCF, Buy @ $0.54
11/27/17	DBS Vickers	Jumbo	0.58	0.61	Hold	PER23x FY18
11/27/17	Lim & Tan	Jumbo	0.58	0	Neutral
11/28/17	UOB Kay Hian	Jumbo	0.565	0.6	Hold	DCF, Buy @ $0.54
12/13/17	DBS Vickers	Jumbo	0.585	0.7	Buy	DCF
12/13/17	Kim Eng	Jumbo	0.585	0.7	Buy	DCF
01/04/18	Kim Eng	Jumbo	0.59	0.7	Buy	DCF, PER26x FY18
02/15/18	Kim Eng	Jumbo	0.57	0.7	Buy	DCF, PER26x FY18
02/15/18	DBS Vickers	Jumbo	0.57	0.58	Hold	PER23x FY18
02/19/18	UOB Kay Hian	Jumbo	0.575	0.59	Hold	DCF, Buy @ $0.53
03/12/18	Kim Eng	Jumbo	0.55	0.7	Buy	DCF
05/15/18	DBS Vickers	Jumbo	0.56	0.58	Hold	PER23x FY18/19
05/16/18	UOB Kay Hian	Jumbo	0.54	0.53	Hold	DCF, Buy @ $0.48
06/25/18	CIMB	Jumbo	0.5	0.62	Add	PER23x CY19
06/27/18	UOB Kay Hian	Jumbo	0.52	0.53	Hold	DCF, Buy @ $0.48
08/14/18	UOB Kay Hian	Jumbo	0.53	0.49	Hold	DCF, Buy @ $0.44
08/14/18	DBS Vickers	Jumbo	0.53	0.57	Hold	PER23x FY19
08/15/18	CIMB	Jumbo	0.515	0.62	Add	PER23x CY19
10/05/18	CIMB	Jumbo	0.46	0.58	Add	PER21x FY20

Jubilee - Stock calls

Date	Analyst	Company	Last	Target	Call	Valuation
10/04/17	NRA	Jubilee	0.043	0.07	Overweight
10/13/17	NRA	Jubilee	0.048	0.067	Overweight
03/12/18	CIMB	Jubilee	0.037	0.051	Add	Sum of parts
06/01/18	CIMB	Jubilee	0.039	0.051	Add	Sum of parts

Jiutian - Stock calls

Date	Analyst	Company	Last	Target	Call	Valuation
04/04/18	Amfrasers	Jiutian	0.064	0.11	Not Rated	PER10x FY18

Stock calls for 24 October 2018

Date	Analyst	Company	Last	Target	Call	Valuation
10/24/18	OCBC	Hutchison Port	0.245	0.36	Buy
10/24/18	OCBC	Mapletree Industrial	1.95	2.01	Buy	DDM
10/24/18	Lim & Tan	Mapletree Industrial	1.95	0	Hold
10/24/18	CIMB	Mapletree Logistics	1.23	1.39	Add	DDM
10/24/18	Kim Eng	Mapletree Logistics	1.23	1.3	Hold	DDM
10/24/18	UOB Kay Hian	Mapletree Logistics	1.23	1.36	Hold	DDM, Buy @ $1.15
10/24/18	Macquarie	SGX	7.05	7.7	Neutral
10/24/18	DBS Vickers	Singtel	3.13	3.64	Buy	Sum of parts
10/24/18	OCBC	Suntec Reit	1.81	1.84	Hold

Xi and Trump may not meet in G20.

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/military/article/2169728/two-us-navy-ships-sail-through-taiwan-strait-move-likely-anger

There is a high chance that Xi will reject to meet Trump in the G20 next month if Trump continues to antagonize China.

Stocks will fall again in November when the 2 leaders don't meet in G20 because the trade war will escalate further.

Temasek retail bonds oversubscribed by 8x.

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/temasek-retail-bonds-oversubscribed-interest-rate-guaranteed-10856234

Did Temasek's retail bond subscription perform well?

Well, the subscription rate of 8x is considered to be just alright but not spectacular.

Why? This is because a government conglomerate like Temasek should do better as it has a better background and AAA credit rating.

Xiaomi IPO was oversubscribed by 9.5x which did better than Temasek's despite having a lower credit rating.

https://www.ft.com/content/c28dc7f6-80b3-11e8-bc55-50daf11b720d

Jardine Strategic - Stock calls

Date	Analyst	Company	Last	Target	Call	Valuation
07/03/18	UOB Kay Hian	Jardine Strategic	36.65	42.67	Not Rated

Jardine Matheson - Stock calls

Date	Analyst	Company	Last	Target	Call	Valuation
07/03/18	UOB Kay Hian	Jardine Matheson	63.2	65.72	Not Rated

Jardine C&C - Stock calls

Date	Analyst	Company	Last	Target	Call	Valuation
07/03/18	UOB Kay Hian	Jardine C&C	30.77	44.13	Not Rated

Stock calls for 23 October 2018

Date	Analyst	Company	Last	Target	Call	Valuation
10/23/18	DMG & Partners	Best World	1.49	1.97	Buy	PER13x FY19
10/23/18	CIMB	Dairy Farm	8.95	9.55	Hold
10/23/18	Lim & Tan	Mapletree Logistics	1.23	0	Hold
10/23/18	CIMB	Sheng Siong	1.05	1.26	Add

The US disgraced Taiwan and Taiwan welcomed it.

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/world/us-warships-sail-through-taiwan-strait-10854036

I didn't know that the Taiwan Strait in Taiwan's territory was an international sea area whereby vessels were free to navigate without permission.

The US vessels sailed through the Taiwan Strait in Taiwan's territory while China naval vessels followed the US in China's territory.  What the US did was telling the world that Taiwan's territory was an international water in which any vessel could perform freedom of navigation without permission.

I couldn't believe that Taiwan would welcome the US's FON in its territory.  What a joke!

OMG! Temasek invests in a high risk business again!

https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/temasek-backed-vertex-invests-cryptocurrency-041123231.html

Cryptocurrency is a high-risk investment and it is still evolving.  Therefore, it is unwise for Temasek to invest in a high-risk business using our government coffer.

Any serious financial institution won't use a public blockchain because confidential information shouldn't be accessed by other public nodes.  This is the reason the world bank issued its bond based on its own private blockchain as this couldn't connect with any public blockchain.  What does this mean? This means there won't be a massive adoption of the public blockchain by serious financial institutions.

Sigh! Temasek is going to lose our money again!

Microplastics found in a human for the first time!

https://sg.news.yahoo.com/microplastic-found-humans-first-time-220000093.html

This is really bad.  We're killing ourselves by ingesting plastics in our food chains.

We've reported about microplastics last year.

http://sg-stock.blogspot.com/2017/12/seafood-health-alerts-in-norway-chile.html

USD has a supply shortage now.

How did we know about the USD supply shortage?

Well, we just need to look at the USD Libor.  USD Libor is at an all time 5-year high now according to the chart above.

USD Libor is the bank rate that the banks in London set for lending USD among themselves and this rate has been trending much higher in 2018 which denotes that there is a supply shortage.  Therefore, this means that USD will continue to appreciate due to the higher rates and supply shortage because of QE tapering.

US housing downturn is brewing again!

The US 30-year mortgage rate is fast approaching 5% and it won't stop rising.

The US home sales have been trending down because of rising interest rates in 2018.

This property downturn doesn't bode well for the USA because it will affect the main street and the wall street.  Property stocks and mortgage-backed securities (MBS) will be badly affected and we'll have a US financial crisis again.

Fake Singapore dollar alert!

There are fake Singapore dollars appearing in Hougang area.  Please be careful!

Japfa - Stock calls

Date	Analyst	Company	Last	Target	Call	Valuation
01/24/17	CIMB	Japfa	0.92	1.53	Add	Sum of parts, PER11.6x CY17
02/10/17	DBS Vickers	Japfa	1.02	1.26	Buy
03/03/17	CIMB	Japfa	0.9	1.41	Add	Sum of parts
03/06/17	DBS Vickers	Japfa	0.89	1.25	Buy	Sum of parts, PER10.1x FY17
04/10/17	DBS Vickers	Japfa	0.835	1.25	Buy
04/17/17	CIMB	Japfa	0.805	0.69	Reduce	Sum of parts
04/24/17	DBS Vickers	Japfa	0.63	1	Buy	Sum of parts, EV/Ebitda6.5x FY17, PER10.5x FY17
05/02/17	CIMB	Japfa	0.605	0.58	Reduce	Sum of parts, PER8.2x CY17, PER7.2x CY18
05/02/17	DBS Vickers	Japfa	0.605	0.84	Buy	Sum of parts, PER10.7x FY17
07/05/17	DBS Vickers	Japfa	0.65	0.88	Buy	Sum of parts
07/31/17	CIMB	Japfa	0.595	0.55	Reduce	Sum of parts
06/22/18	Kim Eng	Japfa	0.625	0.86	Buy	Sum of parts, PER14x FY18
08/01/18	Kim Eng	Japfa	0.745	0.86	Buy	Sum of parts
09/11/18	CIMB	Japfa	0.595	0.8	Add	Sum of parts
10/17/18	UOB Kay Hian	Japfa	0.61	0.9	Buy	Sum of parts, PER12.2x FY18