Calvin Yeo seems to be making a reputation for himself by being the passive income expert of Singapore. It is funny that I never bump into him during my travels in business and the online world. Until now that is.

In his passive income blog, he claimed that he is a “self-made millionaire before the age of 30”. Somehow, something about this claim doesn’t smell right. I went through his blog and there are a lot of articles about dividend investing and stock re-balancing. These are sound articles but the math don’t add up.

A good dividend or stock selection strategy probably yields less than 10% when you average the high gainers from the losers. So, a 10% return. If you start off with 100K capital, it means you only earn back 100k after 8-10 years, depending on your assumption about compounding returns. This path will never lead to the riches as hinted by the direction of the blog.

I suspect that Calvin Yeo made his fortune somewhere else. He was a banker prior settling in Malaysia and might have earned big bonuses there. He also dabbled in properties which I suspect might be the main driver of his fortune.

If I am correct then there is a clear discrepancy between what he preaches and how he actually got rich. My concern is whether people following his blog might be under the false impression that dabbling in dividend or stock investment, can get one rich. I hope that is not the case as there will be big disappointments down the road if they do.

It will be so much clearer if Calvin Yeo provides a path that leads to where he is now, rather than starting from his current position. His readers will very much appreciate how one can achieve his millions if he or she is starting from base one.

Overall, I don’t know how to put my fingers on it but something doesn’t add up to Calvin Yeo. Although he is being profiled on media, that doesn’t mean anything. Most media folks know nothing themselves so it is not difficult to establish yourself as an authority in front of them.