Wealth Creation Blogs Worth Sharing.

For those of you currently working in the resources industry, you would no doubt understand that the potential downside is the punishing rosters and long periods away from home that can take a toll on your family and personal life. Sure, the money is good for the most part, but it comes at a cost. Unfortunately, many marriages suffer irreparably and many industry workers find themselves having to “start again” after relationship breakdown and divorce.  It can be an extremely difficult time and apart from the emotional strain, there’s the stress of having to rebuild financially.  Quite often, you may find yourself in a situation where you’re left with minimal assets and essentially must start again. In this situation, it’s critical to make sure you have your superannuation structured and invested correctly. If you’ve come through a divorce with your superannuation intact, it may end up being your biggest asset. You really need to get it working for you. The othe...

For those of you currently employed on a salary, your employer pays your superannuation fund 9.5% of your earnings payable each quarter. This is known as the Superannuation Guarantee (SG) contribution. Some employers choose to pay monthly. However, most pay quarterly and today (October 28th) is the payment due date for the July -September quarterly payment. Have you been paid your contribution? It’s important to keep track of these payments. It’s your money and it will play a big part in your retirement. The other thing to consider is where this money is invested. Most Australian’s have some level of exposure to the local stock market via their superannuation. Over the last week or so, our stock market has declined by around 4%. What this means is that when your SG payment is made (hopefully by today), it will be invested within your super fund. With stock markets being down a bit, your super fund will be purchasing assets at a cheaper price. Is this important? Try...

Over the last 12 months I’ve published a number of posts specifically for those of you working in the resources industry. As more and more of you connect with me on LinkedIn, it’s becoming increasingly clear, people in the resource industry need to review their Superannuation and Insurance. It’s a positive opportunity to “get your financial self and your future self - sorted.” In the last 12 months there has been little improvement in the resource industry. We’ve seen an improvement in the spot price of coal, in particular coking coal, however this has yet to translate into a meaningful and sustained increase in activity. How do I know this? My client base is a high percentage of resource industry people - just like you, and I speak with them regularly. Also, as a Site Senior Executive (SSE) I keep up to date with contractors, suppliers, exploration/mining managers and other SSEs. What I’m hearing is, there is light at the end of the tunnel, but we’re not likely to see a return...

On January 13 this year I wrote a post The markets are down! What’s going to happen to my super? What do I do? And here we are a little over 2 months later and the contrast could not be greater.  Welcome to the world of investing! So what do all these numbers mean and how does it impact on my super? Well, for the majority of people, their superannuation has some level of exposure to Australian stock markets.  To get an idea of how the market is performing, you can simply follow one of the indices such as the All Ordinaries Index or ASX 200.  Without getting too technical, these are a basic measure of how the majority of the companies on the Australian stock exchange perform on average on any given day.  Normally reported on the news at night you’ll hear statements like” the All Ords went up half a percent today” . On Feb 12 this year the All Ordinaries sat at around 4800 points.  It’s currently sitting at 5240 points which means an increase of...

Many of you may have noticed on your recent superannuation statement that an amount has been deducted for tax. Superannuation tax can be a little confusing, many people in fact believe that they pay no tax in their super.  Unfortunately this isn’t true. Each year your employer pays 9.5% of your salary into your nominated super fund in order to meet their Superannuation Guarantee obligations.  For every dollar that your employer pays into your fund, 15% of it is taken as contributions tax.  It’s worse if you earn over $300k per year when the tax paid jumps up to 30%. If you’re a savvy investor, you’ll have your super invested in funds that earn income throughout the year.  Be it interest, rent, dividends and so forth.  These earnings don’t escape tax. They are in fact also taxed at 15%. Of course these tax rates are well below most people’s personal tax rates.  So having your money in super does mean you’re paying a lower rate.  The trade off...

I’ve posted plenty of information recently in relation to superannuation and there’s no doubt that it can be a little confusing.  I thought it might be useful to put together a quick checklist that you can run through in 5 minutes and identify whether or not your super is on track. Do you know where your super is?  Yes ¨     No ¨ Is your employer paying you your superannuation guarantee payments?  Yes ¨       No ¨ The current rate is 9.5% of your income payable quarterly on 28 Oct, 28 Jan, 28 Apr & 28 July. You should have just received a payment, did you? Can you log in on line and check your current balance?  Yes ¨    No ¨ Is your superannuation invested appropriately based on your time horizon and investor profile?  Yes ¨      No ¨ Do you receive regular communication from an adviser to help with your investment decisions?   Yes ¨    No ¨ ...

So by now we all know that Australian and global investment markets have fallen significantly, it’s on the news, in the papers and I’ve been publishing recent posts about it on LinkedIn. What’s causing it?   Truth is, it doesn’t really matter.  Oil prices are down, there’s talk of China slowing, commodity prices are down and so forth.  Historically there is always something occurring on the world stage that can cause negativity in markets.  Investors start to worry, they sell their investments at low prices, lock in losses only to have someone come along, buy them up and enjoy the gains as things recover. Warren Buffet, the world’s most famous stock market investor famously said, “The stock market is a device for transferring money from the impatient to the patient”. And we can see this today.  As I write this, global stock markets suffered a large decline over night, with the expectation being that the Australian market would follow this morni...

It’s no secret that investment markets are being punished at the moment and we’re all seeing the balance of our super funds dropping.  Not a nice feeling? Welcome to the world of investor psychology.  Investor behaviour is for the most part counter intuitive, when markets are up we’re all happy and many of us want to invest more.  When markets are down, it’s doom and gloom and some even sell out. But if you think about it, that doesn’t really make sense.  In reality, the risk of markets falling is greater when they’re at their highs and the likelihood of them going up is greater when they’re at their lows. For most of our super funds, the longer the market stays down the better.  Most of us can’t access our super for a very long time so a depressed market is actually good.  There should be regular contributions going in to your super fund from your employer and at the moment these contributions are buying into very cheap assets. BHP, t...

Welcome to 2016!  We’re only 2 weeks in and already the media have been reporting large falls on Australian and Global stock markets.   And they’re right, the Australian stock market (as I write this) is currently sitting at almost the exact levels of 10 years ago. So what does that mean for your super fund and how can you take advantage of this situation?  Most people have exposure to the stock market through their super funds, particularly if you’re invested in a balanced or growth option within a retail super fund (Sunsuper, Australian Super, AMP the list is almost endless).  The reality is, the level of the market is only of concern if you need to access your funds. So unless you’re approaching retirement, it’s not really an issue.  Markets will recover, they always do, it’s just a matter of time.  There is however a massive opportunity with market levels so low.  There have only been a handful of times over the past century where ma...

The harsh reality of working in Australia’s mining industry is that it can be highly volatile. One minute you’re enjoying the benefits of working in your dream job, the next minute you’re left scratching your head as to why you’re no longer required.  Over the Christmas/New Year break I read plenty of news stories about Australia’s major mining houses (BHP/BMA, Anglo, Santos, Rio etc.) continuing their cost cutting measures by shedding staff and contractors.  I’ve spoken with many people who have been impacted by this personally and whilst the majority saw it coming, it’s still a difficult situation to deal with. So what should be done?  Apart from the obvious job hunting, there may be some other things you can do in relation to your superannuation and insurance.  With any change in circumstance whether it be employment, starting a family, buying a house and so forth, you should review your superannuation and insurance needs.  For example, if...

I appreciate having all your professional connections and I am pleased to know from your feedback, that you are reading posts you find valuable.  However, to make our connection really work, we may have to Eat that frog.  As author Brian Tracy of “Eat that Frog!” says, “Your frog is your biggest, most important task, the one you’re most likely to procrastinate on if you don’t do something about it now”.  Australian investment markets are currently at the same levels as they were ten years ago. The struggling resources sector has weighed heavily on investment markets.   Not great if you're planning on retiring and accessing your super now, however an excellent opportunity if you've got time up your sleeve. Markets will recover. They are presently at ten year lows.  This represents a massive discount, and if you want to give your super the best opportunity for growth, it should be well placed to take advantage of the recovery now. Maybe...