I've about 6.5% in PL8 held in my private family trust account. When I combine my SMSF and private accounts together this drops down to 2.3%.
40% in one company is a high amount to invest in one company especially something like a LIC in my opinion. Yes there is diversification naturally within the LIC structure but it isn't that obvious what the holding are all the time. Costs can be high if the LIC is constantly moving in and out of companies as it looks to harvest dividends. Most financial advisors (I'm not one and am not purporting to give financial advice) would suggest a mix of stocks or ETFs that number 5 to 6 as a good core to start with. Therefore, the maximum one might consider to invest into something like PL8 would be 15-20% of the monies you have available.
Not sure what sort of cash account you are holding but some ETFs like FLOT, AAA, CASH or even short term US treasury bills in ETFs like TBIL could be a worthwhile location to store your cash whilst waiting for the market. Again most Financial planners would recommend holding at least 10% in cash for such opportunities and in times of uncertainty even higher ratios. The movement of funds to cash and bonds from SMSF is evident of what people are thinking. Have a look at the following Vanguard article it should help you understand what is currently happening in basic easy to understand language.
SMSFs lean towards cash and defensive assets | Vanguard Australia Personal Investor Sign up to their weekly emails they are very useful as I have found out in recent times. If you aren't holding in such a structure and have a poor bank account providing crap interest I'd suggest investing with UBank who are a subsidiary of NAB but only offer banking online. Their interest rate from July 1 will rise from the current 4.75% pa to 5.00%pa one of the best deals available on the market without crappy conditions to meet to be able to get this interest rate. All you need to do is add $200 minimum to the account each month to get this rate. Not hard to do and transfers once accounts are linked if used previously can be instantaneous so no waiting around for money to go from one account to another. Well that is the experience I have had moving money from UBank to CBA or Macquarie for my trading accounts.
If you are going to buy into PL8 I'd suggest dollar cost averaging to smooth out the swings between SP and NTA backing over a 6 or 12 month period. Space out your buys to once a fortnight or month depending on how much you plan on investing into the market. Find a low cost broker to complete the deals for you but ensure you get these listed under your own HIN#. If you think a correction is about to happen it would be better to wait till the % drops a little as its not normal for LIC to trade at such a large premium. There is a list somewhere I can't find it now that lists all LICs on the ASX and what they are trading against their last published NTA backing. Worth trying to hunt that down and I think it came from the ASX website.
I'd suggest PL8 form part of a strategy where you get other income deriving assets into your portfolio at the same time. PL8 probably wont grow as much as a index fund linked to either the Australian general market or a international market such as NASDAQ or World basket but will provide some income through dividends along the way. Last two years they have completed SPP in the last Qtr of the CY where the price usually drops down to the issue price which is close to the NTA or a slight premium above it before moving back upward. Not sure if they will this again this year but you may want to wait until this is completed as well or buy a small parcel and then buy up at that time to a maximum value of $30k. Buying into a VAS, A200 or IOZ would also get you exposure to the same types of shares that PL8 hold and still pay dividends but not on a monthly basis more like quarterly. They won't be 100% FF but at least you will get some income with potential for higher capital growth opportunites than staying in a LIC structure. The fees of the ETFs are lower so better bang for you buck so you want to hope the overall return you get from PL8 is higher than what the ETFs offer to make up for that premium you pay plato to mange the fund. Also the Australia market is only 2% of the gloabl market and concentrated around 10 main stocks (Banks, CSL, and BHP/RIO). Getting exposure to overseas markets comes at a risk but its a big world out there. Using ETF like VGS or IVV would get this exposure for you.
As stated none of this is financial advice just my opinions and learnings from what I read. All care and responsibility of investments lies with you. .
if you haven't done so I'd also suggest looking at the
Free Money & Investing Courses | Rask Education website that has great educational tools for new investors to learn from. The ideas of diversification and what ETFs etc are explained more eloquently than I have put it here and is offered for free. I listen to their podcasts and find them informative and valuable to glean information from.
Good luck with your investing. .
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