March dividends & SSB 3.15% p.a. average yield.

January and February are usually pretty dry months when it comes to dividends.

If not for dividends in March, my passive income in 1Q of any year would be almost zero.

I will blog about my total passive income for 1Q 2023 by end of March or early April.

For now, if I were to do an estimate, passive income for 1Q 2023 could come in at under $40,000.

I shared my plan with regards to SSB, T-bill, CPF and the UOB ONE account in an earlier blog:

SSB, T-bill, CPF & UOB ONE.

I did not apply for the SSBs offered in January and February this year as both offered 10 year average yields of lower than 3% p.a. which was lower than what I would get from my CPF account.

Now, I am not saying that those SSBs were not attractive for everybody but they were not attractive to me as my plan was to apply with money earmarked for CPF voluntary contribution in 2024.

I suppose many people agreed with me as those SSBs were rather badly undersubscribed, with the one offered in February less than half subscribed.

The one that is offered this month, however, is very interesting to me as it is offering a 10 year average yield of 3.15% p.a.

Source: MAS.

With the dividends coming in this month, I would set aside at least $10,000 to apply for the SSB.

I have made a note on my calendar to apply by 28 March 2023.

If the 10 year average yield remains higher than 3% p.a. for SSBs offered in the next few months, I would be able to fully deploy the $38,000 I have earmarked for voluntary contribution to my CPF account in 2024 earlier than anticipated. 

I could do this in 2Q 2023 easily as 2Q and 3Q are usually relatively strong passive income generating periods for me.

In the next day or two, I will talk to myself a bit more on the subject of fixed income and how a meaningful exposure will do my investment portfolio a whole lot of good.

Of course, just talking to myself, as usual.

Reference:
SSB or CPF?