OFW Corner : It’s Hard To Earn Money

September 18, 2012 Leave a comment


“It’s hard to earn a money even you are working abroad.”

I always hear this phrase from my fellow OFW (Overseas Filipino Workers).

Normally, when I ask my fellow OFW why they’re working abroad, their answers will always be like this “ang hirap kumita ng pera sa pilipinas, kaya ako nag-abroad”  (english translation –>  it’s hard to earn money in the philippines that’s why I’m working abroad).

And, if I’m going to ask them back if it’s easy to earn money working abroad they will say “ang hirap kumita ng pera sa abroad, nagtitiyaga lang ako dahil malaki ang sahod” (english translation –> it’s hard to earn money abroad, but it’s worth the sacrifice because the compensation is good).

So let us analyze our situation as an OFW, it’s hard to earn money in the Philippines and abroad, but the level of compensation is higher when working abroad.

What is the conclusion?

Where ever part of the world we are working, a good money is hard to earn…

Actually, we (I am not an exemption to this) always think that those who are working abroad has found the goose who laid a golden egg and their deep pocket has a perpetual source of ca$h. That’s why every time a remittance was sent to our relatives/family back home it was easily spend without discipline.

I guess many recipient of the OFW remittance will crucify me for this remarks.

But the message that I want to deliver to many Filipinos with relatives working abroad is to spend the remittance they received wisely.  Set aside a certain amount of the remittance for savings and investments.

Right now, the debt crisis in Euro nations and the stagnant US economy is threatening the jobs of many OFW’s. This kind of macro-economic always put the jobs of every migrant workers hanging on a thread.

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Bringing More Filipino Closer to Investment

September 3, 2012 Leave a comment


I want to share an interesting report from the Philippine Stock Exchange about the statistics of Filipinos with retail stock trading accounts.

The 2011 report on the “Profile of Filipino Stock Market Investors” published by the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) shows that there are a total of 478,362 retail stock trading accounts owned by Filipinos. These numbers represents only 1% of the Philippine population. (source: PSE)

Compare to other Asian countries, more than 33% of the Singapore population invest in the stock market. I think this is the main reason why Singapore produce more millionaires.

In Japan and Australia, around 25% of their population are investing in stocks; around 18% in Malaysia; around 17 in Hong Kong; and around 10% in Korea.

Compare to the countries mentioned above, I guess Philippines is still far behind when it comes to investment literacy.

Is there any are other way to bring more Filipino people closer to the world of investment?

I was thinking that the media companies in the Philippines (like TV Stations, Newspaper, Magazines etc.) will be a good driving force to promote investment literacy in our country.  Of course this only my opinion, I don’t think big TV stations will trade their prime time slots for telenovela in exchange for the investment advocacy show.

With the help of internet (thru social networks) more bloggers are now promoting financial and investment literacy on their blogs.  Anyway, saving and investment topics are still boring to many Filipinos, it might be more interesting to bet and try our luck on the Lotto (Philippine Lottery) rather than tracking the performance of the Philippine Stocks or interest rates….

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Filipinos on GDP

December 26, 2011 2 Comments


GDP (or Gross Domestic Product). What is it to “Filipinos”?

Before moving on with this topic, let’s define GDP first.

From Wikipedia:

Gross Domestic Product (GDP) refers to the market value of all final goods and services produced within a country in a given period. GDP per capita is often considered an indicator of a country’s standard of living.

From its definition, GDP after all is not just the measure of our Government or Pres-Noy performance, but rather our economic performance as a nation. We should be serious when it comes to GDP matters because it reflects our performance compare to our ASEAN neighbors.

Example:

Vietnam recorded a 6% growth last quarter, and Thailand which half of it’s country flooded still manage a 3.6% growth.

 Actually, the Philippines mass population were not concerned that our GDP grow by only 3.2%. In fact, we are more concern about the showbiz news like couples getting separated or Pacquiao (the pambansang kamao) losing to Marquez.

 I was not an economist but if Vietnam could maintain it’s growth at this rate. I think it will surpass us in just a decade.

As an investor, I feel the frustration every time I see our GDP figures way below our ASEAN neighbors.

The problem on GDP growth is not for the government alone, ordinary citizens like us should do our share in making it better.

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Why Filipinos Are Not Investing?

December 5, 2011 7 Comments


I have made a list of reason (or excuse) why many Filipino’s don’t want to invest or not investing at all. Actually, this is base on my experience when encouraging someone to invest.

Anyway, here are their reasons why they don’t or not investing at all.

  1. I was born from a poor family
  2. I am too young to venture investing (or sometimes too old)
  3. I have no luck (born unlucky)
  4. I need to support my family (sometimes the whole family generation)
  5. I was not a genius (not smart enough)
  6. The economy is not good (bad economic condition suggest not to invest)
  7. My spouse is not supportive
  8. I don’t have a big amount of money to start with
  9. I was scared to loose my hard earned money
  10. My salary is good enough (make sense)
  11. I would rather enjoy my money now than putting it in any investment
  12. Money is the root of all evil (believe me someone answers this)
  13. etc… etc… etc…

Too many reasons isn’t it.

Do any of these reasons (or excuses) sound familiar to you? These types of reasoning make us feel a victim of circumstance, and we are blaming someone or something for our financial misery.

Actually, the folly about this mindset is that when you give yourself an excuse, you are letting someone else or something else controls your life. And since, it is not your fault, you will think that you are helpless to change it.

I think this mindset is the reason why a person never gets rich.

Anyway, if we can only change this mindset and think that we are the one controlling our financial destiny (no external forces controlling us), I guess the road to riches is within our reach. And since, we already realized that we are in control of our financial destiny, it is a fact that our financial prosperity is inevitable.

So my challenge is – “Again, ask yourself why you are not yet rich?”

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OFW Corner : The Chemist

November 23, 2011 Leave a comment


I  hear this joke from 1 of my friend. At first it sounds funny but, after awhile I feel bad since there were sad truth hidden on  it.

Do you know, what is the common occupation of an Overseas Filipino Workers spouse?

It is CHEMIST, which means “Ke Misis o Ke Mister umaasa” this Tagalog word sounds like Chemist. (In English – they were dependent on the income of their wife or husband working abroad). It may sounds a joke, but it is also a sad reality. Actually, I found it a common phenomenon for a family with a kin working abroad, that many of them don’t work anymore and just waiting for the remittance to come.

Actually, this is the main reason why a bunch of OFW’s ends up nothing after working many years abroad. They regularly sending remittances, and their relatives were also spending it regularly. This story of sending and spending (without any saving or investing) money is a disastrous financial habit.

I urge relatives and spouse of OFW’s to do work, so that their extra income can be reinvested and their family’s money can grow. When I say work, it is not necessarily the 8 hours job but other productive thing that can yield extra income or extra savings in which they could later re-invest to grow more.

The job of your spouse or relatives working abroad is not forever, and a single global macro-economic event that will result to unemployment could somehow spells disaster for the family’s income.

Don’t just sit and wait for the remittances to come, every OFW dependents (spouse or relatives) should spend their time, energy and money on ways that builds wealth.

It’s hard to earn a living abroad, I know it because I was an OFW for more than 7 years. And my message to all the OFW’s dependent is to manage their finances wisely, save and invest.

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Making Millions of Millionaires in the Philippines

November 4, 2011 10 Comments


Financial Literacy and Investment Opportunity

When I start this blog a few months ago, its main advocacy is to open the eyes of every Filipino especially those who worked abroad into these 2 things.

I keep on saying that investment is not only for the rich, but it is for every body who wants to get out of their financial bondage.

Now, I become more ambitious by encouraging millions of Filipinos to Invest and become millionaires. Every body could explore the wealth that every investment could offer, and if you are investing now I am very optimistic that it is only a matter of time and you will achieve your goal. So, the next challenge for this blog is to create a million traffic (or visitors per year). I guess some reader of this blog might think that it is quite impossible by just looking at the statistic (number of  hits) of this site.

When I started this blog, it could hardly master at least 1 visitor per day for its 1st 2 months. And, I think this sole visitor was my 13 years old daughter, reading my earlier post. But, after 6 months I was seeing a lot of visitor on my sites, and I start seeing some comments and subscriptions. From at least 1 visitor per day it grows to almost 100 visitors per day, in just a short period of 6 months.

Actually, I was not even on the halfway from this goal of making millions of Filipino millionaires but I am very optimistic that it will happen soon. If this blog could reach millions of Filipino every year, and encourage bunch of them to create wealth through properly managing their finances and investment. I guess I am not that far in achieving one of the ambitious  goal of this blog.

Of course, our country will benefit more if we can encourage millions of  Filipinos to invest. Why?

Let me count the ways.

1.  By investing in either equity or bond, we are pumping more liquidity to our Financial system. If we have a healthy financial system, it is inevitable that economic prosperity will follow.

2.  Normally, every president elect in the Philippines needs to travel a lot by convincing foreign investor. If we can encourage 1 million OFW (Overseas Filipino Worker) and another 1 million hardworking Filipino (living in the Philippines). I guess we have save the precious time of our leader (the President) courting  foreign investors, and he could just focused his attention on other matters.

3.  We can reduce the unemployment rate (or possibly zero out).  Since, cash is available every where, companies who wants to expand their operation will have an easy access to cash. Expanding their business operation means more work force.

Anyway, I guess I was day dreaming (it’s like dreaming an impossible dream). I am an OFW, and investing is one of my way to help my country.

Do you want to be a part of this bunch of Filipino millionaires? Manage your finances now, and start investing.

Let us make our country a better place to live. Isn’t it good to think that you are helping your country and making wealth at the same time.

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OFW (Overseas Filipino Worker) and SSS (Social Security System)

September 30, 2011 5 Comments


One of my colleagues asks me this question: Is it advisable for an OFW (Overseas Filipino Workers) to continue paying its SSS contribution?

Of course, my reply is a big “YES”.

Why? Because, time will tell us that we will not be working as an OFW (with better compensation) forever. Actually, when we reach our retirement age (in which we could not hardly work or even walk), we will need this additional stream of income to sustain our day to day expenses. Unless, you have an investment that’s worth 10 times of your annual income and a gargantuan savings of 10 times of your annual income, I guess you are exempted from paying your SSS contribution.

If you don’t have those numbers above, you should start contributing now before time runs out. It is true that the pension you will be getting from SSS will not be sufficient to sustain your expenses but it’s better than nothing.

The monthly SSS contribution for Filipino working abroad is a bit higher compare to those working in the Philippines. Anyway, I was shocked to learn that from our group of 15 OFW, only 2 of us were religiously and continuously paying our SSS.

After working more than 7 years abroad, I observed that many OFW were not keen on investing, saving and planning on for their retirement. Actually, it’s hard to resist the luxuries that you see while working abroad. And this is the reason why some OFW return home empty handed.

I was thinking that if POEA instead of just issuing an OEC (OFW Overseas Exit Clearance), will also conduct a Financial Literacy seminar to every Filipinos before going abroad. I think by doing this, many Filipinos working abroad will have an idea on how to manage their finances, save and invest for their future.

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The Tale of the Philippine Crab

September 9, 2011 2 Comments


Maybe you already heard the story about “The Tale of the Philippine Crab”. Anyway, I just want to share this story especially to all Filipinos.

The Tale of the Philippine Crab

The story starts when a trader goes to a wet market, looking for a crab. In a crab store, there are 3 baskets of different crabs.

The trader opens the cover of the 1st basket and asks the owner what kind of crab it is. The owner replies by saying that it was an “Alaskan King crab”.

After that, the traders open the 2nd basket of crab and again ask the owner about what kind of crab it is.

When the trader looks at the 3rd basket, he was surprise why the basket was not even covered and he quickly asks the owner? The trader worried that the crab might get out since, it was not covered.

The owner tells the trader that it was a “Philippine Crab” and there is no chance that a crab of this kind will likely get out in that basket because, if there is a single crab going near the edge of the basket, the other crabs at the bottom will surely pulled him down.

I guess there is no need to further explain the message of this story. In our quest for success especially in our work or career, we become this kind crab pulling our colleagues just to gain an edge.

Actually, after more than 7 years as an OFW (Overseas Filipino Worker), I have seen how a small community of Filipinos divided to many small groups. These small groups were trying to outsmart and outdone each others.

I was not exempted from this kind of thinking but, I will start my journey to get out from this crab mentality.

I guess the next challenge is what I should do or what should we do to get out from this mentality.

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Quote:

If you go for revenge, you must dig 2 graves. Dig 1 grave for your enemy, and dig 1 grave for yourself. – Anonymous

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