Special Service Charge of 5% on All Equity Funds

Good news to all!

Public Mutual is offering a Special Service Charge of 5% on all its equity funds for a limited period from 3 November to 3 December, 2008. This special service charge will be extended to all cash transactions (including standing instructions, RCA instructions and switching of low-load units) into the equity funds during the said period.

It is indeed an opportune time for long term investors to take advantage of the current attractive market valuations, by increasing their investment into the equity funds to meet their long term investment goals.

The world's most renowned investor Warren Buffett had in his recent article titled 'Buy American. I Am" published on 16 October 2008 in the New York Times, quoted the following in explaining why he began to invest heavily in stocks: -

" I can't predict the short-term movements of the stock market.I haven't the faintest idea as to whether stocks will be higher or lower in a month - or a year - from now. What is likely, however, is that the market will move higher, perhaps substantially so, well before either sentiment or the economy turns up. So if you, wait for the robins, spring will be over. "

So folks out there do take advantage of this special promotion to increase your investment.

Anorther Fund open for EPF investor to invest!

Yes starting today the EPF investor can diversify their EPF investment into a higher risk syariah fund. Before this Public Mutual EPF investors who prefer to invest in syariah funds can only invest in a conservative to moderate Syariah funds.

Now the EPF investors can invest in the Public Islamic Equity Fund.

Promotion, Promotion !!!!!!

Public Mutual has launched KLIFF Award Celebration Promotion Campaign. In this campaign investors will enjoy a special promotional service charge rate of 5% of NAV for cash investments (PII and PAI) made during the pcriod of 29 Januarv 2008 till 29 Februarv 2008 into the selected Public Series of Shariah-based Funds.

The Shariah-based Funds are:

• Public Ittikal Fund
• Public China lttikal Fund
• Public Asia Ittikal Fund
• Public Islamic Equitv Fund
• Public Islamic Opporturities Fund
• Public Islamic Asia Dividend Fund
• Public Islamic Asia Balanced Fund

Well investors it is a double bonus for you if you invest right now as you are getting a lower service charge at a lower per unit fund price. The fund prices are lower right now as our local equity market are affected by the flagging US economy. You must look this as an opportunity to get a lot of unit trust at a cheaper price...it will lower down your investing cost.

New Details on Investment thru EPF

PANDUAN KEPADA AHLI


KELAYAKAN PELABURAN DI BAWAH
PENGELUARAN PELABURAN AHLI


1.0 PENGENALAN

Mulai 1 November 2007, KWSP telah melaksanakan beberapa pembaharuan dalam SKIM KWSP secara berperingkat di bawah inisiatif strategik ’Bukan Hanya Simpanan’ seperti mana yang diperuntukkan di bawah Akta KWSP 1991 (pindaan 2007). Ini termasuklah inisiatif untuk memperkenalkan Simpanan Asas bagi menentukan amaun yang layak
dilaburkan oleh ahli daripada Akaun 1 di bawah Pengeluaran Pelaburan Ahli (PPA)

2.0 DEFINISI SIMPANAN ASAS

Simpanan Asas ialah satu jumlah simpanan dalam Akaun 1 yang ditetapkan mengikut umur bagi membolehkan ahli memperoleh simpanan sekurang-kurangnya RM120,000 pada umur 55 tahun. Ahli boleh melaburkan simpanan dalam Akaun 1 yang melebihi simpanan asas dalam produk dan menerusi insititusi pelaburan yang diluluskan oleh
Menteri Kewangan.

3.0 SYARAT-SYARAT YANG DITETAPKAN

3.1 Mulai 1 Februari 2008, ahli boleh melaburkan simpanan di bawah PPA tidak melebihi 20% daripada jumlah simpanan yang melebihi Simpanan Asas dalam Akaun 1.

3.2 Pelaburan ini boleh dibuat setiap 3 bulan sekali dan jumlah minimum
pelaburan ialah RM1,000.00.

3.3 Jumlah Simpanan Asas dan contoh pengiraan adalah seperti di LAMPIRAN.

3.4 Syarat-syarat am prosedur di bawah Pengeluaran Pelaburan Ahli yang lain masih kekal dan tidak berubah.

4.0 PERTANYAAN

Untuk maklumat lanjut, sila layari laman web KWSP www.kwsp.gov.my atau menghubungi Pusat Panggilan Telefon KWSP di talian 03 8732 6000 atau Emel enquiry@epf.gov.my

KUMPULAN WANG SIMPANAN PEKERJA
JANUARI 2008


Sila Klik Gambar utk lihat dengan lebih jelas.

Chance for you to increase the return of your EPF savings

I've been waiting for this chance for a long time and now it will be realized. Before this only high income individuals or who have been working for a long time will be able to invest their EPF savings in the unit trust.

Beginning 1 February 2008, 11.4 million EPF members can invest as long as their account 1 amount exceed the required savings amount.

The basic amount that each members have to have is based on their age:
1) 25 years old (RM9,000)
2) 30 years old (RM18,000)
3) 35 years old (RM29,000)
4) 40 years old (RM44,000)
5) 45 years old (RM64,000)
6) 50 years old (RM90,000)
7) 55 years old (RM120,000)

The basic quantum of saving will be access every five years.

Example of calculation: Ali is 30 years old and has RM30,000 in account 1. For 30 years old the basic saving/min that they must have in account 1 is RM18,000. So the amount that he can invest in UT is 20% from (RM30,000 - RM18,000 = RM12,000), amounted to RM2,400. The investor still will have to pace their saving to every 3 months. Same as before.

Table below show the real return that you as EPF member get from EPF savings:

Year	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006
Dividend Rate (%)	5.00	4.25	4.50	4.75	5.00	5.15
Inflation Rate(%)	1.40	1.80	1.20	1.40	3.00	3.60
Real Dividend Rate (%)	3.60	2.45	3.30	3.35	2.00	1.55

So to all EPF memmbers, lets' put your EPF saving into a higher return vehicle....

Another New Goals to conquer!

I attend the Kick Off 2008 meeting today. It was a full house. A lot of people have to stand including me...I was 15 minutes late..hee..hee serves me right. Kota Bharu Public Mutual office should hurry their search for a bigger place or the next year meeting will be seeing people standing outside the meeting room on the stairs.
Well in the meeting that I can only hear but cannot see the speaker or the screen...the speaker had announce the 2008 Challenge and Incentive trip. It is Rome, Italy and Guangzhou & Gulin,China.
I didn't make it for this year Incentive trip...too busy doing other things..:)

In the meeting The Public Mutual rep also announce:
1) Starting 1/1/2008 all EPF investment service charge will be 3%. A drastic decrease of comission for the UTC also due to this :(
2) Starting 1/1/2008 also all cash investment service charge will be 5.5% only. Another decrease in the comission for the UTC. But good news to all investors and would be investors out there..:)

But good news to UTC the FD savings of individuals did not decrease at all despite the buying spree of Public China Ittikal Fund amounting to RM 1 Billion. In October it stood at RM225,445.5Million. According to the rep the FD amount is more than that currently. So it means that they are a lot of cash rich individuals that are waiting for all UTC out there to coax them to invest in a better investment vehicle. So good luck to all UTC out there...remember the person sitting next to you may be the depositor..:)

Fund can Invest More in the Overseas...

STARTING April 1, Malaysians will be able to invest more of their money abroad as they search for better returns.

Bank Negara Malaysia has relaxed rules to allow unit trust companies to invest half of their total net asset value (NAV), or the market value of their investments, up from 30 per cent previously.

This means that unit trust firms will be able to offer additional units in funds that invest overseas.

Such funds have been selling well, but unit trust managers have complained that most of them are close to hitting the ceiling in terms of foreign investments.

"This is good news for unit trust players to come up with more global funds which will give more choices for investors to diversify their investment portfolios," Amanahraya Unit Trust Management Sdn Bhd chief executive officer Roslan Harun said.

"I personally think the figure should be more than 50 per cent of the NAV as local investors' appetite for global funds now is on the rise."

He said investors do not want to be restricted to only investing in the local market.

The announcement could entice one or two unit trust companies to focus only on global funds, he added.

"Players now can come up with products that could actually focus on specific countries, such as China and India, apart from the US and Europe," said Roslan , adding that Amanahraya Unit Trust has applied to launch a global fund.

Another industry player, a senior manager at a unit trust firm, said that this latest move had been long awaited.

"It has been close to two years that the limit was revised to 30 per cent, and some of us had expected it to go up to 60 per cent," she said.

She said that this latest development would certainly enhance investment returns as investors would be given more options for a better risk-and- return profile for their funds.

Great Bonus for Public Mutual Investors!

With regards to our market’s performance during the first half of today’s trading, I would like to reassure investors that our market fundamentals remain strong and we maintain our optimistic outlook on our market's performance over the medium-term. The KLCI opened at 1,189.58 points and declined 8.17% to a low of 1,136.01. However, as of 12:30 pm today, at the end of the day’s first trading session, the KLCI has already seen some recovery, closing at 1,162.91. From our analysis, coupled with feedback from fund managers, analysts and brokers, it is clear that our market’s performance this morning is not an isolated incident.

The sharp fall experienced early in this morning’s trading session was a knee-jerk reaction to the regional market slide caused mainly by the sharp decline of the China indices yesterday. We will continue to monitor the situation but I am assured that our market will maintain its growth position in the long run. Our economy is stable and the outlook for 2007 remains positive. Our public-listed companies also continue to demonstrate progress and provide good returns to shareholders. (Statement From Dato’ Yusli Mohamed Yusoff, Chief Executive Officer, Bursa Malaysia Berhad, 28 Feb 2007)

To some the current KLCI sharp fall is bad news as they are lossing a lot of money. But I think this is a great opportunity to Public Mutual investors in the long term as they can apply the buy low sell high concept. This is a double boon for them as concurrently Public Mutual is running the Award Appreciation Campaign. They will be able to buy at a lower price per unit and at the same time get 1% free unit.

Some of the unit trust investors have switch their equity fund into bond to lock profit. But to do this you have to know where is the lowest point before KLCI bounce back, so you can switch back from bond to equity and make profit. The safer method is to diversify your investment into bond and equity for investor with a large amount of money. But to long term investors who do dollar cost averaging they don't have to do switching. The dolar cost averaging method will ensure that the units will be bought at an actual cost which is lower than the average unit price over the same period.

I think it is a hassle to do the monitoring yourself and to run around to the Public Mutual office to submit your switching form every time there is a great change in the KLCI. This is the job for your fund managers, that is why you are investing in the unit trust fund and not investing directly to the securities in the KLCI.

More Local offerings poised for launch this year

Unit trust have over the years proven their ability to give better returns compared with other instruments, and at relatively lower risks.

A report by Standard & Poor’s Fund Services, dated January 23 2007, indicates that the average return on equity funds last year was 24.88 per cent, followed by asset allocation category of 17.74 per cent.

The Kuala Lumpur Composite Index (KLCI) in comparison delivered lower but still solid 21.8 per cent return in 2006.

“The above clearly demonstrates that unit trusts do deliver respectable returns. Of course, this is buoyed by the good performance of the local stock market in the later part of last year.” Federation of Malaysian Unit Trust Managers president Datuk Tunku Ya’acob Tunku Abdullah said.

The trend pursued by mutual fund companies since last year has been offshore-based funds, and this year alone four have launched such funds

The reason why these foreign funds sold like hot cakes was the poor performance of the local equity market, MAAKL Mutual Bhd chief executive officer and executive director Wong Boon Choy said.

But today, the tables have turned. The KLCI is shooting its way towards the 1,200-level and analysts remain bullish about the market.

In fact for 2006, MAAKL’s local equity funds outperformed the offshore funds, Wong said.

“Take, for example, the one-year period ended December 29 2006: the average total return of the local Equity Growth category was 25.87 percent versus the Equity Asia Pacific Ex-Japan category’s average total return of 22.78 percent,” he noted.

Fund companies unanimously agree that more local unit trust funds will be introduced this year to build up foreign investment capacity, pointing out that most of the 30 per cent of the foreign capacity is used up.

“We intend to launch local funds as the demand is always there. This is in readiness to build up our fund size for future foreign fund launches,” OSK-OUB Unit Trust Management Bhd chief executive officer Ho Seng Yee said.

And build it will. Even as competition increases and margins start to get squeezed, mutual houses have set ambitious targets for their fund sizes.

OSK-UOB plans to increase its fund size to RM3.5 billion this year from RM2.4 billion; MAAKL intends to launch between four and five funds this year to boost its fund size to RM1.5 billion; while RHB Unit Trust Management is working towards a RM1 billion target.

Source: New Straits Time, 6 Feb. 2007