It's moronic Monday, your chance to ask any of those lingering questions without fear of harassment.

I've got a few questions and I don't really have anyone to talk to about them. Hopefully I can get some insights around here.

Just a little background, I'm very new to investing. I've been reading a few investing books (the intelligent investors etc.), just graduated (24 this year) and started working a few months ago (about 30k USD PA from Singapore).

I'd like to think I'm more risk tolerant (but it is really hard to say when it comes to money especially since I'm still very new) that I'm willing to take some risks, spend less money now just to be able to spend more in the future.

I've been planning a bit and would like some feedback about my plan as well. I plan on getting married and getting a house soon (maybe within the next few years). I also want to start my own company but I don't know when. I don't want to take the typical route of always working for someone for the rest of your life. I don't mind earning less just to be my own boss, set my own rules etc but maybe I'm just dreaming a bit too much sometimes esp since I only just started working and have not much experience whatsoever.

1) My planned portfolio will look something like this: * 10% for 2821.HK Bond ETF * 5% for SPDR GLD ETF (I read having some gold in your portfolio is like having some insurance for your portfolio) * 20% for STI ETF (my own country's ETF) * 20% for IWDA (world / global ETF) * 20% for EIMI (Emerging markets ETF) * 15% for learning how to pick stocks (I'm currently very tempted to go into Cryptocurrencies because although it is very high risk, the returns are very attractive)

What do you guys think? I know I don't have an emergency fund and it seems like I'm going to have a lot of commitments in the upcoming years.

2) I want to be a long term investor (not too sure how long, maybe 5 years? maybe 10 years? maybe buy and forget?) but I can't seem to convince myself that I should invest now instead of simply waiting for the market to go into a recession before buying then (especially if I'm going to hold them for a very long time). My reason being the gains that I can make now will probably be dwarfed by what I can make if I bought in really hard at the end of a recession. Then again, I can't time the market so I won't know when the end of the recession will be.

3) Houses in Singapore are really expensive and I'm pretty sure I'm going to get married in like 1-2 years time. So I will be needing some money then for the initial down payment and stuff. Should I be paying off my loan ASAP or just take a really long loan and use the rest of my money to invest instead? I read somewhere that house loan is considered good debt? I don't really know...

4) Can you actually get rich from working hard and extreme saving without investing?

5) Is it possible to gain some level of independence from the herd when investing? I feel like unless I sell my stocks to realise my gains, all my paper gains are subjected to the herd's movement. But I want to keep my ETFs for a long time! I read that you can focus on income investing instead over capital gains investing because even though they're similar, one is paper gain while the other isn't. But then I also read that as a young investor, I should be prioritizing capital gains instead of income gains because capital gains are usually more? since it's the big and stable companies that are giving out dividends to retain their investors. I don't know man there's so much to learn and I probably need to burn myself before I learn.

Any advice is much appreciated! :)

edit: Sorry for long wall of text.

/r/investing Thread