About
OUR HISTORY & FOUNDERSCurtis J. Montgomery
Curtis was born in the United States, graduated from Purdue University (W. Lafayette, Indiana) in 1982 with a B.S. in Microbiology, and slowly migrated from a life of indentured labor toward entrepreneurial enlightenment, which culminated in 1999 with the founding of WallStraits.com Pte Ltd (now WallStraits Pte Ltd).
Kathy Zhang
Kathy was born in Beijing, China, graduated with a B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Calgary, Canada in 1994, and taught herself web design skills in her spare time, eventually designing the first version of WallStraits.com in November 1999. She founded WallStraits first subsidiary, Financial PR Pte Ltd in 2002 and remains its Managing Director today.
Mohamad Azlan
Azlan was the first WallStraits employee, joining the firm in 2000 before it even had an office. Azlan now holds the very busy and multifaceted role of IT Sage for WallStraits, Financial PR (Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, and Hong Kong).
Terence Loo
Terence is a founding partner and Managing Director of Financial PR Malaysia, which began operation in 2003 in Kuala Lumpur.
Danny Chung
Danny is a founding partner and Managing Director of Financial PR Hong Kong, which began operations in 2006 in Hong Kong.
OUR VISION & PURPOSE
WallStraits was formed to empower stock market investors with guidance toward making more intelligent investment decisions. We observe the operations of a business and its products or services, ponder the potential growth and value of such products and services, investigate the financial strength of the company and the integrity and competence of its management, consider competitive forces, and form a hypothesis about the intrinsic value of such a business, which can be compared to the market’s opinion (stock price) each day.
We believe that rational investments (as opposed to ‘speculations’) require observation and experimentation in the valuation of business enterprises. It will never be an exact science, but the quality of observation and the depth of investigation, each continually improved with experience, will separate those able to achieve consistently high portfolio returns from more mediocre and less consistent performance.
Investing is an activity rife with ancient dogma, illogical myths and flawed theories that cannot stand up to rigorous unbiased proofs. Only an honest curiosity to uncover useful truths can raise the intellectual level of stock selection and portfolio management processes. Achieving this is our vision and purpose.
We seek to demonstrate our investment approach every day in the Singapore stock market– putting our money where our mouth is and our reputation on the line each year. Our approach is intensive, so we typically own only a handful of stocks– a focused portfolio. We don’t encourage anyone to copy us, but do encourage everyone to learn from us.
OUR MOTTO & RESULTS
- Investing is Serious Fun!
Our motto from the initial launch of our web site in late 1999 has been that investing in the stock market is something anyone can enjoy and profit from. While investing is fun, it is also a serious matter because it involves your money and your financial future. Our goal is to provide investors with entertaining and enriching information and insights that make them better investors, better prepared to avoid common mistakes and gain in-depth understanding of proven successful business analysis and portfolio management methods.
- We Don’t Recommend; We Demonstrate!
Beginning in September 2000, WallStraits decided to stop just talking about investing and start putting our money where our mouth was by investing a significant amount of our own company’s money into an 8-stock (plus or minus) portfolio to demonstrate the effectiveness of our business screening processes. Over the first 7 years (2000-2007), our WS8 Portfolio has grown to multi-million status with an annual compounding rate of just over 30% (compared to about 14% annual growth of the Straits Times Index during the same time).To view our portfolio and watch as we screen Singapore-listed stocks, you must become an Intelli-Vest Member by paying a modest annual subscription, which includes a free copy of any of our Professor Sage Pocket Books. We hope to welcome you as our newest ‘Intelligent Investor’ member soon!
