Why & How to use Margin Finance to increase PROFIT ?

My purpose of writing this piece is to teach you how to make more money or how to improve your profit from the stock market by using margin finance. As I often said, I walk the talk. My wife and I have a total borrowing facility of more than Rm 100 million from 6 local financial institutions.

If a businessman or investor trades within his capital, he is considered inefficient. Almost all successful businessmen and investors borrow money to do more business or to buy more shares. You must remember, it is the business of the financial institutions or banks to lend out money and they are not there to cheat you. We must not be afraid to borrow to do more business or buy more shares to sell to make more profit.  

The current lending rate is base lending rate of 6.6% minus 2% equal to 4.6% per annum. There is no rollover fee for the first year. After the first year, the rollover fee is 0.5% for 3 months, if you have not traded within the 3 months. If you have not traded for 12 months, the total interest rate will be 6.6%. You can check this out from CIMB or other banks.

Let me tell you how I use my margin finance. For a start I must be able to select shares that have profit growth prospect of more than the interest I have to pay. If you do not know how to select good shares, then you must not borrow to buy more shares.

I normally have shares from a few companies. Often their prices fluctuate up and down and I take advantage of this phenomenon to sell some so that I have funds to buy those really undervalued shares which I already owned or one I newly discovered. As a result, I do not need to pay roll over fee. In any case, I do not use up to the limit of my borrowings to avoid margin call.   

As you know, a big seller was aggressively selling Jaya Tiasa in the last few days before year end and we borrowed almost to our limit to buy it. I asked a few professional fund managers and they all could not think of any good reason why  anyone would want to sell so aggressively just to push down the price purposely. Probably he thought he could buy cheaper later on. Even if anyone wants to sell, he should sell slowly to get a better price.

An old fund manager told me that the big seller could be a foreign fund manager who wanted to close his account urgently in Malaysia.

It is very easy to find companies that can increase their profit annually by more than your borrowing rate. Almost all the well established companies in the finance, real estate and plantation can make more than 6% per year. It is very safe to buy them especially when their share prices are down.  

After you have identified them, you have to wait patiently to buy. There are always some sellers. In the same way, there are always some buyers to buy your shares. So, you do not need to buy or sell in a hurry.     

I am obliged to tell you that Jaya Tiasa is our largest holding in our investment portfolio and I am not asking you to buy it.

Best wishes for 2014

Koon Yew Yin
4th Jan 2014