A glimpse of how 'full' COVID19 vaccination will be..

After a year-ish of Coronavirus outbreak, we all know that COVID19 will not end or disappear, but it'll be just like other diseases (think Chicken-pox, Shingles, Influenza A) where vaccine provides a shield or protection to the majority of the population. Some of the virus like small pox or measles have been rare in community after 30-50 years of vaccination programme. Hence, it's childish for us to think that COVID19 is going to go away just like that after the vaccine is being rolled out.

One of the countries which I admire for their technology advancement and survival despite going through never-ending wars - Israel, which Malaysia does not have diplomatic ties with is currently the leader in COVID19 vaccination. As of today (7th Feb 2021), at least 60% of their targeted population have received at least 1 dose of vaccine. I must state that I am not a supporter of Israel but from the viewpoint of a secular and science person, they did very well in many aspects. In this pandemic, the disease outbreak control was not that spectacular but hats off to their vaccination programme. By May 2021, all of their eligible population will be vaccinated.

A chart of current COVID-19 vaccination status (per 100 people or percentage if you divide by 100)

 

To know what it will be like post COVID19 vaccination, we will take a glimpse into Israel's early data (please take note that both Modena and Pfizer mRNA's vaccine which is deemed more superior and newer technology requires 2 doses of vaccine, with the vaccination date 14-21 days apart. It is also mentioned that full protection or benefit should be realized only after a month after the first dose and if you follow up with the 2nd dose). Even with the rapid Israel vaccination, at the end of 1st week of Feb 2021, we know that barely 1/3 of Israel's population fall into the category. However, they are starting to see some benefits like drop in severe illness, hospitalizations, new cases and mortality. 

Remember in November, I posted an article on how will COVID19 end? With the Israel roll out of the vaccine to its mass population, it's time for us to look out for:
1. Transmissivity of COVID19 post vaccination. By March or April we should see Israel's COVID19 cases drop at least two-third (2/3). 
2. Mortality rate of COVID19 - vaccines 'teach' our body to learn how to fight Coronavirus. Hence, after vaccination, we should see mortality rate of COVID19 to be less than half of what it is in Israel today.
3. Benchmark number of cases vs Israel's mobility (available in Google) . We should see the cases coming down slowly and mobility of Israel's population increases.

Why Israel's data is important?
1. It is the first country in the world to have completed its full COVID19 vaccination. 
2. We can see the change of human behaviour post vaccination. It's not just about humans moving around but the confidence of the vaccinated population going around without catching another bout of COVID19.
3. Recovery of economy and local travel which is essential in rebuilding local economies should be seen. Tourism which is the worse-hit sector should see some improvements. 

Global stocks recovery (especially on the recovery stocks) are highly dependent on the successful roll out of COVID19 vaccine. While we might not have herd immunity for years to come but the least vaccine can do (hopefully) is to reduce the symptoms if we are unlucky and contract it. The most likely event is we will still get COVID19 and its newer variants but our body will know how to 'deal with it' earlier and prevent us into entering more critical stage of pneumonia which not only require life support and lots of medical resources but permanent damage to the lungs or even death.

While I am deeply disappointed with Malaysia's vaccine plan, I do hope that we, the normal ordinary Malaysians will be able to pay and get our hands on good vaccine. After all, our life matters and nothing is worth more than that.

Watch the Interview with Grantham

 

My thoughts after watching Bloomberg's interview with Grantham.

1. He is very thoughtful, straight-forward and managed to summarize what is the market right now.
2. His quote of "High growth stocks is valued higher and normally is based on DCF model or anticipated dividend in future. However, high growth stocks can be overvalued. And if it's overvalued, it's overvalued anyway."
3. He rightly summarizes that "P/B is low because it's sitting on poor quality asset, Dividend Yield is high because it's waiting for a dividend cuts, P/E is low because of poor future earnings visibility". 
4. He sees that currently lower growth stocks might overperform the high growth stocks not because of high growth stocks is not growing but it's being overvalued at current prices. Lower growth stocks is trading at way cheaper valuations and has the potential to rise in terms of valuation more (in percentage) than overvalued high growth stocks.

I would encourage you to watch the interview as it offers different viewpoints and watch how Jeremy Grantham argues his points. I find it very impressive and downright truthful.

eCCRIS by Bank Negara Malaysia - a way to check for fraud and your financial status

One of our friends contacted us and discussed about an experience of being scammed. Nothing was lost, fortunately but all the stress and sleepless night endured are a reminder to us that there are certainly many unscrupulous syndicate out there waiting to fish our hard earned money.

Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) has years ago came out with some remedies and a portal for us to monitor our financial standing. This includes knowing one's payment track record for the past 12 months, total outstanding amount and monthly payment amount. If you've forgotten, it's called the eCCRIS. 

Below is a snap shot of eCCRIS and the link to it is https://eccris.bnm.gov.my/eccris/

Snapshot of eCCRIS of BNM

From the snapshot above, you can see that the details are being provided:

1. When the credit facility is being approved
2. Name of Financial Institution
3. Is it a Joint or Individual account
4. Financial Institution Branch
5. Account number
6. Total Outstanding
7. Instalment amount 
8. Any arrears for the past 12 months (0 means no and 1 means missed or late payment for that particular month)

Just in case you're wondering how the log in page looks like, here you go:

Log In Page of BNM's eCCRIS

Promo: Guardian 50% off all Shampoos and Cosmetics until 1st Feb 2021

Guardian pharmacy (or I should call them beauty shop now?) consistently runs promotion throughout the year. I was once told by their staff to watch out for promos on last weekend of the month. So here you go, something that is essential for everyone (sorry except for those who are bald and couldn't use any shampoo).

50% off all cosmetics products

50% off all Shampoos and Conditioners

Phillip Futures - 2021 Outlook: Post Covid and Beyond

One of our authors has attended the Phillip Futures Webminar yesterday and they have shared the content via Youtube. Do take note that this is shared by Phillip Futures Sdn Bhd to the public. Ant On The Street  shall not be liable for any reader's actions nor take any credit for the viewpoints shared. 

Year 2021 Enhanced Marriott Bonvoy benefit (Fast Forward to Elite Rewards)

Recently Marriot Bonvoy has started to send e-mails to their members on promo on their membership programme. Under their current promo, members are able to speed up the process to earn "Elite Status" - that's what they call for the tiered membership rewards. 

Promo #1: Members will be awarded 50% of the Elite nights in Feb 2021, similar to 2020. Under this arrangement, you will get 5 nights if you're Elite Silver, 12 nights if you're Elite Gold or 25 nights if you're Elite Platinum in 2020. This is automatic and elite nights will be credited automatically in Feb 2021.

Promo #2: From 16th Feb till 27th April, all stays with a minimum of 2 nights will be awarded double elite nights and double points. Remember to register for the promo when it's out.

Promo #3: Up to 40% off if booking is made using points during off-peak or low season. 

For those who wants to take advantage of the promos above to achieve Platinum status, you may go plan ahead and book 2 nights stay after 16th Feb 2021. With this promo, you will only need 25 nights stay to earn yourself a Platinum status (refer to the perks that comes attached with it) With hotel prices at multi-year low right now, it's never been a better time to go and book yourself some stays and achieve the status that you're aiming for. However, just a word of caution, do take very good care of yourself as COVID19 cases has been in the rise for the past few months. 

Views and Projections for 2021 - Equities, Economies etc

As we enter into Year 2021 with lots of hope, various world-class analysts has came up with views and expectations for the Year 2021. What I remember clearly in Q3 and Q4 2020, we were often told that World's GDP will be the greatest at 3+%, which is never seen for the past 10 over years. Malaysian economy was 'expected to grow at 7%!'. Fueled with such optimism, we ended Year 2020 with pretty good returns in the stocks and indexes for almost all major stock markets.

However, as the days continue to pass in 2021, we realized that reality is fundamental will 'rationalize' the stock prices. Those who overshot their fundamental will have a pullback and those undervalued ones will play catch up. The recent political developments, rising COVID19 cases and resumption of Regulated Short Selling does a big impact on Malaysian stocks. 

In this article, I will share my thoughts and views on how 2021 will likely pan out. None of us have a crystal ball hence we are 'guesstimating' and 'forecasting' and after that place 'our bets' in the stocks or financial instruments that we believe will do well.

1. GDP Growth
My personal view is that the world's GDP will not bounce back >3% as per the optimistic economists think. The reason is due to point no. 2 on vaccine. Demand destruction sometimes is harder to recover and it will definitely take time. However, as Year 2020 caused the world's GDP to drop to a level where we were 2 years ago; from the lower base, it's definitely expected that the world's GDP will continue to rise but at a slightly more moderate ~2.8-3% instead of >3% that some economist forecasted. 

The caveat is however if Oil Prices (both Vegetable and Crude) keep increasing, it might cause a higher GDP (as a lot of countries like Saudi, Malaysia, Brunei's GDP as very tied to commodity prices). The more bullish economists of >3% might come true should Crude Oil stayed above USD55bbl and Soy and Palm Oil being the largest vegetable oil stays elevated for a longer period of time. 

2. Vaccine and COVID19
The vaccine roll out will be quicker in more developed countries (it's currently proven that mRNA technology is more effective and it needs colder storage temperature). However, the poorer countries will have difficulties accessing. This will continue to cause more lockdowns, more death and lower productivity as work places will need to shut down, movements of people being restricted to slow the spread of the virus.

I believed that COVID19 vaccines based on mRNA will be more successful than the traditional approach of muted virus and cause less side-effects. The downside is the logistical and storage temperature challenge. It will hence take a longer time and benefits the larger, more advance economies. Due to this, more advanced countries will get to move around earlier (will lead to faster economic recovery) vs poorer and less developed economies. 

3. Political Stability
US Presidential election just ended with Joe Biden set to be next President. There will be some changes to policies but it seems at the moment that US "fight against China" will continue. It is expected that any maneuvers be more predictable and not as chaotic as before (i.e. officials being sacked via Tweets). 

Malaysian Politics will continue to see a lot of changes, volatility and a big potential of GE15. Sarawak election might coincide with GE15 but all depends on the COVID19 cases and vaccination programme. Until a stable political alliances is found between PKR, DAP, PAS, UMNO, Bersatu, GPS etc and proven that the coalition can work, it'll continue to be chaotic and unstable. The results coming from GE15 will lay a foundation on whether the cooperation might continue or not.

Worldwide wise, it'll continue to see some volatility and changes in political arena. However, with the big brother US and China now seems to have a more stable political footing, it can be seen that policies making and agreements can be expedited or discussed extensively, which is good for world economy.  

4. Defaults/Shocks
There is an inherent risks of continued defaults especially in the SME arena. Also, in industries like Travel, Tourism, Restaurants and Hotels, Airlines which are hit the worst. The trend might continue and the increased in debt (due to debt payment deferment) will continue to 'haunt' the industry as they will have more debts to service going forward. 

Remember that any form of loan moratorium is just to defer your payments but the outstanding amount will increase. This although will bring hard hit companies through the 'winter' but they will spend a bigger amount of profit paying back debt later on.

5. Tourism
Tourism sectors including airlines and restaurants will continue to suffer at least for 1H 2021. Local tourism will resume first, estimated to be from May-June 2021 for more advance countries and year-end for poorer countries due to the slowness in the reach of the vaccines. 

International Travel is expected to restart in Q4 2021 but destination will be the more developed countries where the majority of the population has gone through vaccination. Countries who still have not vaccinate at least 80% of their population might face difficulties in attracting quality tourists and will have to rely on neighbouring countries or domestic tourists.