We went through some of the most important stuffs that happened this year, and now... prepare yourself (and your delicious pizza!) to see more details about it...
For us, Life and Investing are a lot like surfing: we never really know what’s coming until we get into the impact zone.
The 2021 itself was a critical juncture for investors where various issues were also impacting our investment outcomes. Being nostalgic for a moment, things that were unthinkable years ago were happening this year:
1. We saw how inflation sucker punch Mr. Market after it lost the fight since decades
2. We were mesmerized by incoming flock of millennial investors, triggering bull run
3. A crypto currency that was called as “fraud” yesterday became a “safe haven”
4. Tech crackdown was driving fierce reform globally
… and as investors who try to surf in this rough sea of change, we believe the key for us to act in this tumultuous times is to regain control, open our mind and keep following the fast-changing tide.
Taking this surfing analogy – roaring tube of wave can be scary, yet opportunistic.
Like Eminem once said, “Look, if you had one shot or one opportunity to seize everything you ever wanted in one moment… would you capture it, or just let it slip?”
We learned that Post COVID crisis and disaster can also be a toggle for meaningful change to investors especially this year. This helped some of us to not only sit and making funny investing memes, but also to follow some interesting trends. We’re not talking about skydiving, getting a tattoo or some other cartoon bucket list activity. We’re talking about something that we find every day: the real deals, such as the booming technology adoption of Indonesia, primarily in banking.
The uneven impact of pandemic caused most Indonesians to understand the increasing risks of offline transactions. Inflation grip on everyone’s wallet drove the trend of financial literature, either popularity of stocks, or investing in high yield product. 2021 was the moment; it’s like someone flipped a switch. The urgency of going digital has become obvious to everyone.
Faced with this vicissitudes, we looked at digital banking space and confident that new players such as Bank Neo Commerce (BBYB.IJ) can gain more prominence.
Bank Neo Commerce approaches majority of Indonesians by revisiting how we should do "Banking" – seamless, profitable, and available everywhere. For example, the bank was the first one who ever introduced high yield interest-rate products for individual investors, offering short term deposit rate as high as 8% (this may happen because a true digital bank can pass-on their overhead cost savings for its customers).
We shared our conviction about Bank Neo Commerce on how our clients should take position in this stock because the company came up with the best concept of digital banking for Indonesians. Our discussion on the company’s concept was well covered by Boris’ commentary and Edward Lowis, with Paulus Jimmy also gave their deep company analysis about BBYB.IJ.
Despite we made the first call, of course it won’t mean anything if not for our clients (romantic mode on).
This year the market made a well response to the idea of Bank Neo Commerce. As their company’s cat got more popular than any other cats, and the app downloads also went ballistic from only 2.5 million in May, to reaching almost 18 million of Indonesians by end of year; the same was also true for its share price.
But hindsight is 20/20... When we discussed digital bank early this year, of course we have had our fair share of doubts whether this could successfully play out (truly... who knows what tomorrow might bring). This digital concept was fairly new. It took time for us and clients to really digested the idea of digital banking.
What made us stick to the end was all thanks to strong faith from our dearest clients (please, don't tell me to stop this romantic mode. I’m getting used to it), and the amazing company's management team who kept coming with magnificent result (like, literally). Together, these heroes, i.e our investors and the terrific companies’ managements helped the ride of Bank Neo Commerce to be a stunning one.
Philosophically, this year we also try not to limit ourselves with merely growth or value investing.
Research and investing are not a segmenting process for our mind to choose a side, but rather a continuous rethink to find new answers.
We no longer see that inflationary environment is always bad for tech stock, for instance. The same case that energy crisis is not always good for coal. To surf in this sea, you have to have the attitude of dancing with the wave.
One of the best ‘dancers’ among companies was none other than Saratoga Investment (SRTG.IJ), which we are very fortunate to have them as our call list. It manifested on many things: gold story, oxygen crisis, rise of telecommunication, and the popularity of insurance technology – all at the same time. We were very lucky to share the story about Saratoga to our clients at the opportune time.
It is natural that with beautifully run company such as Saratoga may extend to those who work with it. Our minds were at those that firms catch the trend such as Aneka Gas Industry (AGII.IJ), firm that was putting a lot of energy to supply the whole Indonesian’s oxygen during COVID times. Good stock-call aside, we extend our appreciation that a lot of us were saved by the company’s product that readily available in all hospitals, when we needed them the most.
Another hero that we found was also put amazing business concept during pandemic. This year would not be as great if we did not meet Adi Sarana Armada (ASSA.IJ), the company who were committing to turn skillful bike riders into of fast growing delivery team. We saw the ASSA’s team business plan back in the day, and a lot of times, we were continued to be amazed by how innovative the team’s mindset was. The great people behind it were the reason why ASSA’s stock formed a 10-feet wave within few short months as the product Anteraja got so popular.
Lastly, this year won’t also be complete without mentioning the companies that were very brave to venture in the whole new journey. We can mention some outstanding progress for RANC.IJ who turned brick mortar grocery shops into a digital retail, ESSA.IJ who switch from LPG player into Ammonia and Blue Ammonia, HRUM.IJ who extended business from coal to nickel, and DMMX.IJ who might be the next digital infrastructure company
Going into the next year of our journey, we try to re-approach these new trends of investing and unlearned the thoughts that did not work to call for a new conviction and action. We believe that’s the only way to catch the roaring tube.
But for us brokers, what matters in the end it was a dazzling experience to surf with you (okay, now you can turn the romantic mode off). As a closing statement and to close this year, we wish you a wonderful holiday and cheers to a new year (or... another chance for us to get it right). See you in 2022!
Links to previous reports that we highlight here:
Edward's on BBYB and Jimmy's on Digital Banking Report
