In memory of a Singapore’s investment legend
This is my 500th blog article! For a long while, I thought hard about what to post for this milestone article. It has to be meaningful of course and should resonate with readers on the topic of building wealth. Eventually, I decided to dedicate this article to the late Dr Michael Leong, founder of financial portal, Shareinvestor.com. There are many battles that a wealth builder must fight on a daily basis but there is only battle that everyone cannot afford to lose and that is losing our health. On 12th February 2016, Dr Michael Leong lost his battle with colon cancer.
To be honest, I do not know Dr Michael Leong at all but I heard about Shareinvestor.com a few years ago from one of the business associates. He told me that if I aspired to grow my blog, then I must benchmark against the standard of Shareinvestor.com. I was curious about what he said and then decided to check out the website.
True enough, I realized that Shareinvestor.com is a powerful data-driven investment website that allows retail investors to make informed investment decisions on stocks. Apparently, Dr Michael had founded the website in 1999 and then sold it to SPH in 2008 for $12 million. In this regard, Dr Michael was way ahead of his time and had pioneered a financial portal that provides much value to the investment community.
His death came across as a shock because only a few months ago, he posted online on 12 December 2015 that all his cancer cells had disappeared after the latest treatment. So to hear the news of his passing on is really very shocking. After all, he was only 54 years old. As I read his poignant article, my heart was filled with immeasurable sadness. I could tell that he was a man who loved his family a lot because after his retirement, he spent a lot of his time with his family. Even though he enjoyed investing and had also devoted a lot of his time doing financial research, he had always placed his family above everything else. I like his quote “Life is truly about the family and everything else, including my investments, pales in comparison”.
Very often, in the pursuit of money, we always overlooked the importance of health and family support. I agree with Dr Michael Leong that when we started our wealth journey, money is important to us. But once we have enough money, this is when tough choices must be made. We, as human beings, tend to choose the path of making more money because in doing so, we will have the sense of achievement. Very few people will feel contented and stop pursuing more monies. As a result, we will take things for granted and overlook the more important things in life.
In the stock market, you may lose monies from time to time but it is important to note that you will always have the opportunity to earn back the monies. But when it comes to health and family love, sometimes once you lose them, you may not get them back again. In this regard, it is important to cherish what you have and make the effort to do the things you really want to do in life. Life is unpredictable and you don’t want to look back in regrets.
Sometimes it really freaks me out thinking what would happen to my family should I depart this world now. My family is my everything but unlike Dr Michael Leong, I have not achieved financial freedom. So I still need to trade time for money. For me, working for money is not a choice. But if one day I have enough money, I know what is going to be my choice.
Currently, there are many investors who are wallowing in self-pity because they have lost a lot of monies in the stock market. But if they bother to think deeply, they should take things easy and look at the bright side. Losing money is not the end of the world, but losing your health is. In the face of death, everyone is equal and it doesn’t matter how much wealth you have built. At the end of the day, on your deathbed, it is the family support that matters more. Your legacy is defined by your relationships with the others. Do you want to be remembered for being a rich but stingy man or a person who is wealthy but always generous?
Dr Micheal Leong had touched the lives of many investors and he had contributed a lot to the development of the investment community. Singapore’s investment community has indeed lost a very important figure. I am not sure whether we will have another Dr Micheal Leong or Dennis Ng who had so much passion and willingness to share their knowledge with the others. But one thing for sure is that they are truly Singapore investment legends.
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Magically yours,
SG Wealth Builder
