Bank Negara increased OPR to 3.25%

As expected, Bank Negara (BNM) has, at its Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting today (25 January 2018), made the decision to increase the Overnight Policy Rate (OPR) by 25 basis points from 3% to 3.25%.

This is the reverse of the last action taken on 13 July 2016, which reduced the OPR by 25 basis points from 3.25% to 3%.

For investors, if you are holding shares of financial institutions, this is a short term good news to you. If you are holding shares which the company is having high debt/equity (D/E) ratio, you need to evaluate how much will this OPR rise impact on the company's financial situation.

If you are planning to take a hire purchase (eg. buying a vehicle), act fast before the borrowing interest rate increases soon. If you are serving a home loan, expect your monthly commitment to your mortgage to slightly increase from now on.

You might probably also be interested to read about:

• How the OPR can affect the economic climate

Book: Algorithms Notes for Professionals

An algorithm is a procedure or formula for solving a problem, based on conducting a sequence of specified actions.

Algorithm plays an important role in software engineering. It is one of the major subjects compulsory for students studying computer science, computer engineering or similar IT course in university/college.

Algorithms Notes for Professionals is a freely downloadable PDF e-book compiled from Stack Overflow Documentation, released under Creative Common BY-SA.

Among the algorithms discussed in this e-book are:

• Graph
• Graph Traversals
• Dijkstra’s Algorithm
• A* Pathfinding
• Dynamic Programming
• Kruskal's Algorithm
• Greedy Algorithms
• Prim's Algorithm
• Bellman–Ford Algorithm
• Line Algorithm
• Floyd-Warshall Algorithm
• Catalan Number Algorithm
• polynomial-time bounded algorithm for Minimum Vertex Cover
• Multithreaded Algorithms
• Knuth Morris Pratt (KMP) Algorithm
• Edit Distance Dynamic Algorithm
• Online algorithms
• Big-O Notation
• Sorting
• Bubble Sort
• Merge Sort
• Insertion Sort
• Bucket Sort
• Quicksort
• Counting Sort
• Heap Sort
• Cycle Sort
• Odd-Even Sort
• Selection Sort
• Trees
• Binary Search Trees
• Binary Tree traversals
• Lowest common ancestor of a Binary Tree
• Searching
• Substring Search
• Breadth-First Search
• Depth First Search
• Hash Functions
• Travelling Salesman
• Knapsack Problem
• Matrix Exponentiation
• Equation Solving
• Longest Common Subsequence
• Longest Increasing Subsequence
• Dynamic Time Warping
• Pascal's Triangle
• Fast Fourier Transform
• Algo:- Print a m*n matrix in square wise
• Check two strings are anagrams
• Dynamic Programming

It is a very handy reference book for software engineers and computer science students.

Click here to download Algorithms Notes for Professionals for free.

How to apply for MyDeposit to get government to pay for deposit of your 1st home

If you are a Malaysian who plans to buy the first home in your lifetime, you ought to act quickly to apply for the MyDeposit Scheme so that the government will pay for the 10% deposit of your first home for the amount up to RM30,000. As long as the terms and conditions are met, you need not repay back this money to the government.

This will definitely able to help you to save a substantial amount of money to own your first home.

Application for MyDeposit Scheme has already been opened since 15 December 2017 and will be closed on 15 February 2018.

Among the terms and conditions for this MyDeposit Scheme are:

• You must be a Malaysia citizen.
• Application can be made as a household (husband and wife) or as an individual for unmarried persons.
• It must be for the first home in your lifetime. For husband and wife, both of them cannot own any home under their name before or during the application.
• Age of applicant must be 21 years old and above.
• The applicant must be earning a monthly income (in order to be eligible to buy a home), and the household monthly income must between RM3,000 to RM15,000.
• You must have a clean CCRIS record.
• The home to be bought must be from a new housing development project. It is NOT applicable to buying of subsale home, building house on a land with own contractor, PR1MA, PPA1M, RUMAWIP, PPR, MyHome and any Rumah Mampu Milik.
• The price of the home (as stated in S&P document) must not exceed RM500,000.
• You have not signed the S&P of the home before getting approval of your MyDeposit application.
• You must sign the S&P with your developer within 30 days after getting approval for your MyDeposit.
• The approved amount of money will be paid directly to your developer.
• You cannot rent out the home under this scheme. It must be for your own family stay only.
• You cannot sell the home within 10 years from the date of S&P.

Under normal situation, you are not required to return your approved MyDeposit money to the government. However, you will need to return it to the government under the following condition:

• You are not able to fulfil the home loan instalment and the home is put on bank auction.

To apply for this MyDeposit Scheme, you need to register an online account in SPRN website and follow the instruction from there.

Click here for more information about this MyDeposit Scheme.

Good luck!

RM500 matching grant (GS500) to be given free to SSPN new deposit in 2018 for primary school beneficiaries

On top of the recent good news about SSPN-I tax relief of RM6000 max has been extended until year 2020, the National Education Savings Scheme (Skim Simpanan Pendidikan Nasional, SSPN-i) setup by the National Higher Education Fund Corporation (Perbadanan Tabung Pendidikan Tinggi Nasional, PTPTN) for the purpose of higher education has on 2 January 2018 announced another good news for all existing and new SSPN depositors whose beneficiary is studying in primary school.

The good news is...

The government has allocated a fund for the first 500,000 existing and new SSPN depositors who deposited at least RM500 new fund into their account during 2018, whose beneficiary is studying in primary school. These accounts will received a free matching grant incentive of RM500 in their SSPN account (Insentif Geran Sepadan Percuma RM500 a.k.a. GS500).

 

The terms and conditions are for this GS500 are as follow:

• This RM500 free matching grant incentive is only allocated to 500,000 eligible SSPN accounts on and first come first serve basis.
• The age of the beneficiary of the SSPN account is between 7 to 12 years old or is studying in primary school in Malaysia.
• New fund of RM500 must be deposited into the SSPN account between 1 January 2018 to 31 December 2018 (deposit - withdrawal >= RM500).
• This RM500 free matching grant incentive can only be withdrawn after the beneficiary has reached the age of 18 years old, or during closure of account due to either the depositor or beneficiary has passed away.
• This RM500 free matching grant incentive cannot be used for tax relief.
• This RM500 free matching grant incentive will be automatically given to the eligible SSPN accounts. There is no form to be filled up.

Fund can be deposited into existing SSPN account using FPX real-time online payment after login into the online SSPN-I Statement of Account website.

Source of reference:

• Simpanan RM500 Percuma, RM500 Untuk 500,000 Pelajar

 

 

PayNet Instant Transfer fee for individual and SME to be zerorized by 1 July 2018

I remember that during early December 2017, Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) had announced a fee waiver of 53 sen (with GST) of PayNet Instant Transfer fee to be effective in 2018. PayNet is a merged entity of MyClear and MEPS.

Now we have already reached the year 2018, but when I checked on the banks' online transfer function, the 53 sen Instant Transfer fee (with GST) is still there. Am I missing something?

Yes! The effective date of this Instant Transfer fee waiver is on 1 July 2018, so there are a few more months to go.

In addition, I have found out that there are conditions for this Instant Transfer fee waiver as below:

• Only bank account belonged to individual and SME can enjoy the fee waiver. The waiver is not applicable to bank account of big corporations.
• To enjoy the fee waiver, the maximum amount of money in the transaction should limited to RM5,000 only. If you want to transfer more than that using Instant Transfer, and yet want to enjoy the fee waiver, perhaps can break the amount down and perform multiple transfers, with each transaction not exceeding RM5,000.

My SUM 0026 digital programmable timer 3-pin plug socket

Electrical programmable timer plug socket is very useful for you to automate the time to turn off a particular electrical/electronic appliance, and the time to turn it on again.

Some of its usage scenario including:

• Switching off your WiFi at mid-night and switching it on again in early morning.
• Switching off your television and set-top-box at mid-night and switching them on again the next morning.
• Switching on water sprinkler system in your garden at certain hour everyday, and switching it off again after some times.
• Switching on night lights at night and switching them off during day time.
• Charge the BC-01 multimedia Bluetooth speaker with alarm clock and FM radio for 2 hours everyday.

Typically, there are 2 types of electrical programmable timer plug socket: mechanical and digital. Mechanical programmable timer is usually cheaper, but has limitation of 24 hours single setting only. Digital programmable timer such as this SUM 0026 supports 7-days on/off setting and can accommodate up to 10 different on/off settings.

This SUM 0026 digital programmable timer 3-pin plug socket is certified by SIRIM with a SIRIM sticker.

It has an internal NiMH 1.2V battery which is able to remember its clock time and settings for more than 100 hours even when their is no power supplied to the unit.

Before you can use it for the first time after unpack, you need to plug it in an electrical socket and charge its internal battery for about half a day. Initially, you might see its LCD display showing distorted characters. That is normal. After some times, the unit will function well with the correct info display.

After that, you need to reset its memory by pressing the small round Master Clear button with a sharp object for a few seconds, then release it.

Then, you need to set its clock time:

• Press and hold the Clock button.
• With Clock button pressed, press the Week button again and again until current day is shown.
• Continue the same step with the Hour button and Minute button.
• With Clock button pressed, press the Timer button to toggle between 12 hour and 24 hour clock mode.

To set a timer setting:

• Press and release the Timer button. The LCD will show ON_1 for the "switch on" time for 1st set of setting.
• Press the Week button again and again to set the day or block of days for timer on.
• Repeat the same to set for Hour and Minute.
• Press and release the Timer button. The LCD will now show OFF_1 for the "switch off" time for 1st set of setting.
• Set the timer off settings for Week, Hour and Minute respectively.
• Note: timer on can be either earlier or later than timer off.
• Press the Clock button to exit from timer setting mode.

To use the timer function, you need to press the On/Auto/Off button until you see Auto displayed on the screen. When it is in On position, device plugged into it will always turned on; when it is in Off position, device plugged into it will always turned off.

There is a Random button, which will randomly pick a time between 6pm and 6am.

Note that this SUM 0026 digital programmable timer 3-pin plug socket has a maximum load of 13A and 3.12 kW.

Blackmores Multivitamins plus Minerals tablets as gift and also for self consume

During this multiple-festive season of year-end, Christmas and new year, if you are wondering about what to give as gift to relatives and friends, perhaps you can consider health supplement such as Blackmores Multivitamins plus Minerals tablets.

Blackmores is named after its Australian founder Maurice Blackmore (1906-1977). The company (ASX:BKL) is public listed in Australia Stock Exchange since 1985. They are passionate about natural health and inspiring people to take control of and invest in well-being.

Blackmores Multivitamins plus Minerals tablet contains essential vitamins and minerals to provide your body and mind with all-round nutritional support and help maintain health every day. It helps supplement an unbalanced diet in one-a-day dose. Its active ingredient includes:

• Vitamin A
• Vitamin B1
• Vitamin B2
• Vitamin B3
• Vitamin B5
• Vitamin B6
• Vitamin B12
• Vitamin C
• Vitamin D3
• Vitamin E
• Calcium
• Choline bitartrate
• Iron
• Folic acid
• Inositol
• Manganese
• Magnesium
• Potassium
• Zinc
• Biotin

Daily supplementation with a broad range of vitamins and minerals can provide "nutritional insurance" by helping to provide an optimum intake for the maintenance of good health. A Harvard review published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 2002 recommended that all adults should take a multivitamin daily. Statistics suggest that many people are not consuming optimal amounts of vitamins in their diets. Low levels of vitamins can contribute to the development of a range of conditions.

The most cost effective Blackmores Multivitamins plus Minerals is the gift pack as below, which consists of 1 bottle of 120 tablets, 1 bottle of 60 tablets, and 1 bottle of 30 tablets. Altogether there are 210 tablets in one pack. The price I bought is RM78.90, which is 37.57 sen per tablet.

The shelf life of this product is 3 years. Its manufacturing date and expiry date is printed on its label.

This product is formulated for adults to take one tablet per day. For children under 12 years old, there is another product called Blackmores Kids Multivitamins plus Minerals.

Blackmores Kids Multivitamins plus Minerals has the following active ingredient:

• Vitamin A
• Vitamin B1
• Vitamin B5
• Vitamin B6
• Vitamin B12
• Vitamin C
• Vitamin D3
• Vitamin E
• Equiv. Thiamine
• Nicotinamide
• Folic Acid
• Biotin
• Calcium
• Iodine
• Magnesium
• Manganese
• Zinc

Blackmores Kids Multivitamins plus Minerals tablets are chewable with strawberry vanilla flavour with no artificial sweeteners, and not to be swallowed as whole.

This product is formulated for children of age 2-6 years to take 1 tablet per day, and for children of age 7-12 years to take 2 tablets per day.

The most cost effective Blackmores Kids Multivitamins plus Minerals is the twin pack as below, which consists of 2 bottles of 60 tablets each. Altogether there are 120 tablets in one pack. The price I bought is RM51.95, which is 43.29 sen per tablet.

The genuine products will have a Ministry of Health (Kementerian Kesihatan Malaysia, KKM) hologram sticker with a unique serial number for each bottle.

For the Muslim, this product is certified Halal by the Al-Iman Islamic Society Inc. of Australia as shown in the logo on its label.

SSPN-i tax relief of RM6000 max has been extended until year 2020

You might be awared that the National Education Savings Scheme (Skim Simpanan Pendidikan Nasional, SSPN-i) setup by the National Higher Education Fund Corporation (Perbadanan Tabung Pendidikan Tinggi Nasional, PTPTN) for the purpose of higher education is able to provide you personal income tax saving, which is one of the good personal finance means for resident individuals to reduce their payable income tax.

The maximum amount of personal income tax relief for new saving deposits placed in SSPN-i for the benefit of your children during each year of assessment is RM3,000. This mean if your children's SSPN-i account is deposited with RM3,000 additional savings (new deposit - withdrawal = RM3,000) in the year, you can deduct your taxable income for the year by the same amount of RM3,000.

If the additional savings during the year is less than RM3,000, you can deduct your taxable income for the year by the same amount, which is less than RM3,000.

If the additional savings during the year is more than RM3,000, you can deduct your taxable income for the year by RM3,000 only, as RM3,000 is the maximum.

However, National Budget 2013 had announced that this maximum amount of SSPN-i tax relief be doubled to RM6,000 for a period of 6 years from assessment year 2012 until 2017. The maximum amount will fall back to RM3,000 after 2017.

Now, the good news is, National Budget 2018 announced on 27 October 2017 has further extended  this SSPN-i maximum RM6,000 tax relief period for another 3 years, which will continue from assessment year 2018 until 2020.

This means that the maximum tax relief from SSPN-i new deposits will remain as RM6,000 until assessment year 2020.

Auspicious dates in 2018 for housewarming, open house, party, gathering, etc.

Here is the list of auspicious dates in 2018 for organizing and hosting meet-up with friends and/or relatives (会友), which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu.

The dates are applicable for housewarming, open house, home party, gathering, potluck, and any other similar functions to meet up with friends and/or relatives. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

Auspicious dates for baby first haircut (Mundan) in 2018

In many culture, religion and/or tradition, the first haircut of a baby is considered an important milestone for his/her life. The day is known as Mundan, Chadakarana, Halaqah, Upsherin, etc.

Here is the list of auspicious dates for baby first haircut in year 2018, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

Auspicious dates in 2018 for getting a baby or childbirth

Here is the list of auspicious dates in 2018 (year of Dog) for getting a baby (求嗣), which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu.

The dates have good element(s) to embro/faetus. Traditionally, the dates are referred for conception planning (making love and expecting a baby to the family). Nowadays, people also make reference to them for Caesarian delivery of new born. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

Auspicious dates for starting new job / post / assignment in 2018

For employees, especially those in leading/managing position, here is a list of auspicious dates  in 2018 for starting new job/post/assignment, including joining new company or joining new team in existing company.

It can be applied to first day reporting to new company/department/office/position, or going for the post to lead/manage a new business unit/team/project/programme. It can also be applied to assuming new job position after promotion/restructuring/relocation exercise.
It is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu.

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

Auspicious dates for marriage proposal or engagement in 2018

Before becoming the life partner, marriage is proposed by lover and engagement is made.

Here is the list of auspicious dates for marriage proposal or engagement in year 2018 (year of Dog), which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

Auspicious dates in 2018 for signing contract, register for marriage, etc.

Here is the list of auspicious dates in year 2018 for signing contract, signing offer letter, register for marriage, receiving religious baptism, and other similar agreement-related activities.

It is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

Auspicious dates for wedding / marriage in 2019

Many couples plan for their wedding more than 1 year ahead in order to have sufficient preparation time.

Here is the list of auspicious dates for wedding/marriage in year 2019 (year of Boar), which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

If you are looking for auspicious dates for wedding / marriage in 2018 (year of Dog), click here.

Auspicious dates for renovation in 2018

Here is the list of auspicious dates for home or office renovation in year 2018, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

Auspicious dates for moving to new house / office in 2018

Here is the list of auspicious dates for moving to new house/office in year 2018, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

 

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

Auspicious dates for opening business in 2018

Here is the list of auspicious dates for opening business in year 2018, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu.

It can be applied to new business opening, or reopening of business after a break/holiday. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.