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In 2008, the year of the Great Financial Crisis, I wrote an article in July that year, that was published on The Business Times and it went like this: It was Monday (yes, just 2 days ago) and I [...]

Do you know that there are two ways to die in Singapore? One is to die testate –with a will and another is to die intestate – without a will. When you die without a will, your assets will be [...]

A year ago, at about this time, market watchers were generally pessimistic about 2019. After all, just a month ago on Christmas Eve of 2018, markets (represented by MSCI World Index) fell by [...]

Retirement today is more than just a matter of accumulating enough money. Increasing life expectancy has made retirement an extended stage of life. If you’ve started looking into planning for [...]

It has been eleven years since the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) in 2008. This event has changed the economy of the world, the mindset of investors and the investment philosophy of Providend [...]

Pre-order a copy of “Money Wisdom – Simple Truths For Financial Wellness” at https://www.providend.com/money-wisdom-order/ today! Written by Christopher Tan, CEO of Providend, this [...]

Many skeptics, especially people who have never invested before, regard investing as another form of gambling. Even though there’s a thin line between the two, they are two vastly different [...]

Many years ago, a foreigner made a joke about our army in front of me. He said our army is like boy scouts, only good for marching during National Day Parade because unlike other armies, we have [...]

Following the National Day Rally announcements on the option (not a requirement!) to retire later and the increase in CPF contribution rates for older workers, Christopher Tan, CEO of Providend, [...]

Last week, we introduced the Personal Wealth Equation to you. And if you still remember, on the investment side of the equation, there is really no need to constantly guess where the markets are [...]

Building wealth requires understanding what matters and, at the same time, recognizing what you can control. The intersection of and distinctions between these two concepts are important to [...]

Over the years, investing has been compared to riding the waves or being on a roller coaster ride. However, at Providend, we believe that investing is more like gardening. As long as we stay [...]

At the dinner table some months back, my daughter suddenly blurted out that she wanted to watch a concert by Ed Sheeran. As many of us will probably know, it cost a few hundred dollars just to [...]

When people do financial planning, they often scrimp and save for the future that might never come. That is why at Providend, we adopt the purpose-driven financial planning approach – To [...]

Since Providend started back in 2001, we have always adhered strictly to two guiding principles that differentiated us – One is to go on a fee-only basis to remove all conflict of interest and [...]

“Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.” —Socrates In our consumeristic-culture where discontent is promoted and material gratification is encouraged, learning to be content [...]

There are two distinctive phases for retirement planning- Accumulation and Withdrawal. However, many of us tend to only focus on the accumulation bit pre-retirement and often neglect the [...]

Active investing can stimulate a rush of dopamine, a neurotransmitter associated with excitement and, potentially, with addiction. Akin to gambling, active investing gives investors a thrill. The [...]

Instead of living for the weekends, or counting down the years until retirement, you need a reason to get out of bed every day. And that reason needs to stem beyond money. After all, what are you [...]

Near-death experiences can not only change our perspective on death but also empower us to live more meaningful, fulfilled lives. Watch this video as Christopher Tan, CEO of Providend, shares a [...]

Do you know of any magic indicator that can always successfully point out the next market crash? If not, does that mean that all these economic indicators are useless? Well, we don’t think [...]

Do you judge people by how much money they make? Money holds a lot of power both in our minds and in the real world. It can mean the difference between getting by or thriving, and it can also [...]

The market has fallen for the first time in 2019! But fret not. This video was recorded only yesterday and by today, the market has gone up again- further proving the point that it is almost [...]

In a world with so much geopolitical issues and uncertainty, retirement seems to be a scary subject to think about. Retirement planning during withdrawal phase is more complex because retirees [...]

All investors want to have successful investment experience. This is why many try to time the market in order to get the most out of their investment. However, this takes a lot of knowledge, time [...]

People always tell me that the financial services industry is an exciting industry to be in. Every day, either in the papers, on TV, radio or on social media, analysts will predict what will [...]

About a month ago, I gave a talk at the Seedly Personal Finance Festival entitled “Insurance – Cutting Out the Fluff” to an audience of almost 1200 young people. In the talk, I shared about how [...]

On 22nd December last year, I invested the monies in my SRS account into one of the investment portfolios that my company manages. About one month later on the 19th January, I went to check on [...]

Worried about not having sufficient financial resources to take care of themselves if they meet with an accident or suffer an illness, a group of friends decided to come together at age 40 to [...]

I have not been writing about investments for quite some time. And the reason is that there is really nothing new for me to talk about. You must be thinking that I am joking. So much is happening [...]