Incredible Streak : A local Jeweler 💎 Sparkles 💍 With a Hattrick ! {2nd Apr '25}

  My prediction of a 78% probable drop in the local index due to the net 300+ point drop in the oldest US equity index over the two day nuisance local holiday was surprisingly proven wrong as the local index rallied +0.85% at the close, though losers handily crushed gainers with a 637-288 margin as recent winners KL Kepong and Nestlé M'sia, both dropped, the former by 1.4% and the latter by 2.2% while other less recent contributors to the enduring record, CIMB , Tenaga Nasional , Petronas Dagangan and CelcomDigi featured in the Top 20 Gainers' list.

  The abovementioned forecast caused me to dispose of just under half my remaining stake in Poh Kong💍, which, as the 13th scalp of '25, corralled the 1,119th & 1,155th links in the unbroken chain of gain dating back to 2020, at the $1.04 open, which proved to be the day's low. Another lot was sold at $1.06 a bit later to ameliorate the bad timing but the undervalued gold-related stock closed up nearly 4% at $1.07 on the tailwind of the yellow metal's stellar over-long-weekend jumped to fresh all-time highs. This intermittent contributor thus secures 116 decades in the ongoing miracle!

    

    The intention set in the morning for a synchronistic day ahead was somewhat fulfilled by the Japanese market going nowhere after several days of weakness after the widespread 28th Mar ex-dividend date as seller dominated action in Tokyo, sending many stocks to 52-week lows & others, like barely-missed-buying at ¥ 2,723 on 13th Mar bellweather stock Toyota tumbled into technical support zones from after last years Black Monday meltdown in August. After lunch, I also fortuitously picked up some money from the floor of a kopitiam that shaved 6% of my frugal food bill for the day! Every cent helps in this crumbly economic environment! Also, for many years now, picking up carelessly-abandoned money has portended windfalls in the stockmarkets !!!

 

   Hence, the combined score leapfrogs over 19th Dec's 1,197 points to become the 7th highest score thus far at 1,199, level with 20th Dec' 24 !!!

 

With the local market closed 2 days for the religious holiday, the marathon takes a [reluctant] break while open markets mostly tumble!

 

Incredible Streak : 🎌TWO🎌 in a Row with #28 Econach エコナックa Day after #19 Tobishima 飛島 ! { 28th Mar '25 }

    The old Nippon Lace , which almost went bust in the '90s and then in the '00s gets partially sold again on the ex-dividend day, its first payout since 1969 ! I had harbored a desire to earn from this stock ever since learning about it obliquely via the book ' Unequal Equities' which I purchased on eBay in 2017, partly due to a mysterious attraction to its name. 

    When I finally pulled the trigger last July, it was almost entirely speculative as the company hadn't paid a dividend in ages & looked very unlikely to do so in the foreseeable future! Tricked by what seemed to be an upside breakout, I bought in less than 3 ticks from its peak that month & within a month, it tumbled to ¥90 with the broader market suffering its worst sell-off since 1987 in August 2024! Then, a chance to escape was missed because of the evanescence of its intraday pop to ¥151 on 8th Nov. However, the good results released that previous day was a sign of better things to come & so an excellent quarterly report at the end of Feb '25 spurred a more robust jump to ¥183, the highest allowable price on the the 26th of that month, furnishing the perfect excuse to pare my holdings from 1,200 to 800.

   And so, a most improbable win manifests from the vortex at least a couple of years into the gestation period, making it two consecutive🎌 wins & 1,198 points in the combined score!!!

Incredible Streak : The Odyssey goes ON with🎌#19 Tobishima 飛島 Exiting on a 2nd Disposal ! { 27th Mar '25 }

  It was a tough choice between two 🎌 equities both acquired in 2018 but underperformed thereafter, with Nippon Felt 日本フエルト dropping 33.8% by its pandemic-printed low, while Tobishima 飛島 more than halved from the original ill-time entry very nearly at the 2018 peak! Fortunately, two cost-averaging purchases, & six dividends later, the price was lowered to a tad below ¥1,600 and thanks to generous dividends, the total income surpasses ¥50,000 after today's sale!

  The year's take from the Japanese isles thus pops past  ¥203,000, already exceeding all the full annual winning tallies since my debut eight years ago, save for 2021 & the last two years, the fastest pace to date both in terms of yen amounts & contributors, the combined score now just eleven points distant from the all-time high as at end-'24!  

   I am certainly heartened that yesterday's maiden entry into Eisai エーザイ closed on the day before ex-dividend tomorrow with a paper 'saving' of  ¥ 4,900, more than 1 commission while less recent purchase Sakai Heavy 酒井重工業, a tractor maker, actually covered both commissions on paper by the close, at  ¥ 9,100. Of course, both paper gains are expected to disappear when they go ex-dividend tomorrow morning! Celebrated with lunch at a ' ryotei'  料亭!

 

Incredible Streak : IJM reprises its role as #37 from the 20th...{26th Mar '25}

   With Japanese stocks not really rising as the widespread ex-dividend date looms two days away , #37 IJM has to step in to support the winning streak running not far from empty locally, with only six 🎌 paper gainers left [ likely far less once the 28th arrives ]. & about four locally. Nonetheless, a win is a win is a WIN no matter how small and so the miracle sails on...improbably, incredibly & even miraculously !

  Today also witnessed a strange intra-day ramp in Kawase Computer カワセコンピ: the stock suddenly jumped a minute before 2pm Tokyo time & over 415,000 shares were traded before it peaked 5 minutes later at ¥294 before gapping down back to ¥236 & closing at a loss of 2% thus dashing hopes for its role as a streak extender [average price transacted was ¥257.626 ! ]. 

  

   I also finally committed to long-stalked drugmaker Eisai エーザイ at an unchanged  ¥ 4,321 as it narrowly overtakes Yaskawa Electric 安川電機 as the most expensive 🎌stock acquired thus far! 

  

  The former's price is resting on a secondary uptrend line joining the lows in 2003, 2009, 2010 & 2011 and based on P/B &  dividend yields going back to 1976, the fair value suggested is anywhere between ¥ 5,000 and  ¥ 10,000. However, based on EPS, the undervalued range is likely between ¥ 3,000 and  ¥ 4,000. 

    The charts below give a snapshot of financials surrounding the '82 low and the '88 peak, with an adjustment factor of  0.76518 after bonus issues:

Dividend quantum has multiplied almost 21-fold since then, while EPS has increased 3.64 x!

Will the Japanese equity market bottom in July, 60 years after the major bottom in 1965?

 

      At the time, Yamaichi Securities, the dominant broker in Japan was teetering on bankruptcy [it would finally go bust 32 years later as a consequence of the Bubble Economy bursting] as customers frantically withdrew billions of yen from investment trusts earning 6% from the flailing underwriter for 80% of the phalanx of new companies lining up to be floated on the 2nd Section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange. This was inadvertently revealed by a rogue paper in May 1965 in defiance of the establishment's attempt to suppress the news. 

The Bank of Japan agreed, under duress from the Finance Minister Tanaka to supply 'unlimited' support after already promising  over ¥18 billion to the sinking broker. The market bottomed 2 months thereafter. 

Incredible Streak : 🎌Lonseal ロンシール工業 Spurs the Marathon to 1,155 Days & it's the #15/86 🎌 in '25/since '17! { 25th Mar '25 }

   Buying some insurance against drops bigger than dividend quantums anticipated on the 28th when most 🎌 stocks go ex-entitlement. Lonseal ロンシール is paying out a bigger than average ¥70 per share [4.4% yield] & so poses a high risk of dropping way more than the dividend quantum while I'm eyeing many other stocks in that market !

  The marathon baton-receiver thus becomes the fifteenth 🎌 scorer this year & brings the tally to 86 since July 2017 with 3 months left to the 8th Anniversary & the target average tally per year upgraded to 11 from ten!  In contrast, it took until Aug 19th to attain the same 15 winners last year, almost five months away, making the current pace a scorching one, even in comparison to the record 23 that eventuated in '23 !!!

 

Incredible Streak : Poh Kong 💎 Gleams 💍 & Takes the Baton two-wards 1,154 Successive Days ! {24th Mar '25}

  The local jeweler first delivered on 31st Jan this year as #13 when sold a tad above $1.01 & 7 weeks later, is pared down to the original 800 shares with another sale $1.05 the day before it goes ex-dividend to attain a combined score of 1,193 points, just sixteen away from besting the all-time high of 1,208 on Dec 31st 2024, tying with 13th Dec as 12th highest!

Incredible Streak : A Swiss food giant's 35-year-listed, 113-year-old local arm feeds a Relentless Streak of Financial Freedom ! {21st Mar '25}

                  

     How wonderful it is that Nestlé M'sia, bought speculatively yesterday for the largest transaction in the stock ever since my debut purchase in Apr 2014 delivers after just ONE day this round : bought for $62.2497 and 89% sold for $63.8826 to yield the second T+1 'contra' gain in a row, and the 3rd 'contra' gain this week, after yesterday's partial hiving of IJM and Monday's 85% paring of CIMB ! The last equity is now trading 6% below my fortuitous exit just 5 ticks below last week's intraday high of $7.34. If I had waited just one day more, escape from the last purchase of 118 shares would have been impossible without a loss, but now I will be entitled to 65% more dividends than I would if the ex-dividend date had been ever a day after!

Jazzed to reach a combined score of 1,192 points, leapfrogging over 11th Dec '24's 1,190 score to tie with 13th Dec for 12th Best Score thus far!!! An added cherry on the icing is #5 CelcomDIGI's 3% drop to 6.2% below my final exit a week ago, opening the door to more rounds as I look to re-enter closer to 3 year/14.5 year lows of $3.10!