2024 Year-End Review and 2025 New Year Outlook

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Reposted from my blog

A programmer's desk for the 2024 year-end review

Previous year-end reviews:

Milestone reviews:

These important posts are all under the Diary category on my blog.

Ten years of programming craft

Ten Years of Programming Experience

The BGM here should be Ye Shengtao’s “How Many Ten Years Are Left,” a song that sings out so many feelings about life.

In 2014, at 18, I left my hometown and went to Beijing for university. That young man back then knew nothing about the future. From then on, I drifted from place to place. During these ten years, both I myself and the world underwent earth-shaking changes.

From “Shahe Town” to “Zhichun Road” to “Shilipu”; from “Changping” to “Haidian” and then “Chaoyang”; from “Beijing” to “Dublin.” I experienced much glory and dreams, many troubles and heartbreaks. I traveled ten thousand miles, read ten thousand books, and met many different people. I grew from a small-town exam-taker into a working person. I was lucky to choose computer science, a major full of technological dividends, and witnessed the rise and saturation of the mobile internet, the surging rise of AI, the peak and retreat of globalization, peace and conflict, and the continuous progress of human technology. The S&P 500 rose from 1,900 points to 6,000.

“Computer science” was already a popular major back then, but it absolutely did not have today’s TOP 1 status. At that time, Beihang’s undergraduate computer science ranking was said to be 4th. Only after starting university did I formally write my first line of code. I began learning C and Python at the same time. For a beginner, two languages at once meant total confusion: braces { versus newlines, printf versus print, compilation versus interpretation, static versus dynamic. Python even still had 2 and 3 back then. Many concepts only became clear later, until now I can recite them like family treasures. Later I successively used C++, Java, GoLang, TypeScript, and C# as my main languages for periods of time. Out of interest, I also learned niche languages such as Lisp and Rust. In sophomore and junior year, I finally started to get a feel for it. During those two years I tinkered and self-studied a lot, helped by the school’s hard-core courses. In senior year I began internships and formally entered the industry. I previously summarized my four years of university and three years of master’s study. I have to say, doing a master’s was really a waste of time. It is just that China is too competitive, and even finding a good job often requires graduate school. I was already 25 when I graduated. After going abroad, I found that most people start working after a bachelor’s degree, enter the industry early, and get promoted and raises early. Now I have worked full time for more than three years. Counting previous internships, I have experienced six companies. Looking back, over all these years I touched many things only shallowly, while my resume became quite flashy and full.

It is truly as Jin Yong wrote: Dugu Qiubai began with the “sharp green steel sword, too rigid and easily broken,” then moved to the “Ziwei soft sword, flexible and adaptable,” then in middle age to the “heavy sword without edge, great skill appearing clumsy,” and finally to the “sword of grass and wood, returning to simplicity,” where flowers, grass, and trees can all be swords. That is the highest realm. Programmers are the same.

There is another song I also like: “You Were Once a Youth,” the theme song of the film The Ark of Mr. Chow. Every lyric really sings my heart, from past romanticism and idealism to today’s realism, nostalgia, and longing. The wheel of history rolls forward. Fate has pushed me along unimaginable roads toward unknown paths. Although I make New Year outlooks every year, once the time scale stretches to ten years, life cannot be predicted and should not be limited. My current life was unimaginable to me ten years ago, and today’s me cannot imagine life ten years from now. People often overestimate the short-term progress of themselves and the world, but underestimate long-term progress. This is the terror of exponential growth. I hope I will always remain a youth, and continue to keep curiosity, kindness, and optimism toward the world.

A personal review of home, books, travel, and work

2024 Personal Review

This year was another steady year, like previous years. My J-personality trait was fully maxed out.

Although there was nothing earth-shattering or thrilling, and I basically stayed in my comfort zone the whole time, my inner world has become very strong. I can now stay in the comfort zone with a clear conscience :) I do not seek to go fast, only to go far.

This is actually also because the knowledge I have learned in recent years has made me stronger inside. As the saying goes, knowledge is power. Stand on the shoulders of giants.

Hao Xulie’s “If you do it comfortably, you can do it for a long time; if you do it for a long time, you can do it well.” I believe in the “compound interest of time” advocated by Buffett and Munger, and I will be “a friend of time” together with Luo Zhenyu.

Buying a Home

Following last year’s New Year wish, I successfully bought a home in Ireland this year.

Buying a home was not something I absolutely had to do, and I do not think it is a rigid need.

According to the data in Just Keep Buying, from an investment perspective, buying a home is not a good choice. Of course, that is an analysis based on data, because real-estate appreciation depends a lot on region and era. In addition, because real estate is illiquid, it is easier to hold for a long time and obtain acceptable investment returns. But based on backtesting, buying the S&P 500 is actually stronger than buying property. Still, home ownership brings many other psychological and social benefits, such as a stable life.

I do not plan to stay in Ireland for many years either, so my need for a stable life is not huge. In the future I still want to develop in the United States, where the ceiling is higher.

However, according to Peter Lynch, from the perspective of investment mentality, young people are advised to buy a home first, then invest in stocks. Because buying a home requires preparing a down payment, while stock investment is recommended with money you will not use for many years: five years, ten years, even forever. After buying a home, the down payment is already spent; you only repay the mortgage each month, and the certainty is higher, so financial planning becomes easier. Otherwise, you do not know how much money to prepare for a future home purchase.

A mortgage is a relatively safe form of leverage, with an obvious magnifying effect on assets. This is especially true for a first home, where banks and governments usually have many preferential policies to use. For example, in Ireland, the maximum loan is basically four times annual base salary, with a 10% down payment, so the maximum leverage is nine times.

However, my biggest motivation for buying was still Dublin’s absurd rent. Because the price-to-rent ratio is high, buying is actually more cost-effective than renting. The mortgage is quite a bit lower than rent. In addition, although Dublin housing prices have already risen for ten years, compared with income and economic growth they are not as abnormal as in China. Add the income premium of being a programmer at an American big-tech company, and getting on the property ladder is still quite easy.

Buying is much more troublesome than renting: mortgage, viewings, bidding (in the end I bought a new build at a fixed price, avoiding the absurd bidding of second-hand homes), and contacting a solicitor.

After handover came decoration and housewarming. I am not a particularly diligent person, so the back garden of my terraced house has been full of wild grass, and I do not want to deal with it.

My quality of life feels much better, and I enjoyed five months of freedom without housemates. But it is still a bit lonely. I may consider finding some tenants later.

The most important lesson is: the most important thing in buying property is location; everything else is secondary.

In Ireland, realizing the Chinese dream is truly not difficult. I lived in Beijing for eight years before. Even if I smashed the wall panels, I could not put together a down payment. I sighed, “How can I get tens of thousands of mansions, and shelter all the poor scholars in joy?”

Reading Ten Thousand Books

This year I read about 25 books: list of book reviews.

Books I especially recommend:

If, like me, you are very interested in science:

Friends often ask me to recommend some investing and personal finance books. I usually recommend The Psychology of Money, Just Keep Buying, Little Turtle’s Investment Wisdom, Beating the Street, and The Millionaire Next Door.

After reading these, the point is really to understand a few things. 1. Margin of safety. Investment should use money you will not need for a long time, more than five years. Keep six months to three years of living expenses on hand as cash equivalents; the exact length depends on age, family situation, and work. 2. Stocks greatly outperform real estate, bonds, gold, and other assets. 3. Passive index funds greatly outperform individual stocks and active funds. 4. Going all in directly beats DCA and market timing. 5. Buying and never selling beats market timing. 6. The United States and US stocks beat other countries. 7. The hardest part of investing is psychology: chasing highs and panic-selling, emotional short-term thinking, all need to be overcome.

People often say, “Pessimists are right; optimists move forward.” But after reading more history and science, I believe: “Optimists are right and move forward.”

Traveling Ten Thousand Miles

This year I only made three trips. One was to Wexford, Ireland, to see cute puffins.

The UK and Switzerland

Another was to the UK (a self-driving trip in the Scottish Highlands) and Switzerland (Zurich, Interlaken, Jungfrau, Lucerne, and Rigi).

From Dublin to Edinburgh I took an ATR 72 turboprop. It was my first time flying on a plane that was not Boeing or Airbus, and I was very nervous.

I happened to encounter the Edinburgh International Festival. Street performers were everywhere, with all kinds of performances and “strange” people. People mountain people sea.

The Scottish Highlands self-driving route really lives up to its reputation. Driving on mountain roads felt excellent, with mountains and water all along the way.

On triangular yield signs, Ireland writes YIELD, the UK writes GIVE WAY, and Switzerland leaves it blank.

Once again I sighed that London is a place of outstanding people and scenery. The concentration of TOP talent is probably the highest in Europe. I visited the offices of TikTok, CAMEL AI, Bloomberg, and Amazon, and met friends there. TikTok’s canteen was the best I have eaten in Europe, even better than Google’s.

I experienced the Eurostar from London to Paris, with “one location, two inspections,” going through the Channel Tunnel. It is indeed convenient. But the price is not competitive compared with flying. The main advantage is convenience, since train stations are usually in the city while airports are in the suburbs.

I happened to miss the Paris Olympics, but Paris’s urban construction has indeed improved a lot, with many more bike lanes. There were also fewer homeless people and idlers on the streets. Paris is suitable for poor people: comfortable life and good social welfare. It is also suitable for Chinese people. Chinese food is even better than in London, and cheaper. London is suitable for elites, with more opportunities.

I also experienced the European high-speed train from Paris to Zurich. It was the best train I have taken overseas. Its speed and comfort were not inferior to China’s high-speed rail, and it had Wi-Fi.

Switzerland is truly perfect for J-type people. Public transportation is developed, punctual, dense, and frequent, with trains, boats, buses, and trams coordinated together. On this trip I visited Lake Thun in central Interlaken, Grindelwald First, which was a filming location for the Korean drama Crash Landing on You and attracted huge traffic, with many Koreans coming. In the north I visited Lake Lucerne and Mount Rigi. It was truly “at sunrise, river flowers are redder than fire; in spring, river water is green as blue.” Luckily I went to Scotland first and Switzerland later; otherwise the contrast would have been huge. Unfortunately I did not get a chance to visit Google’s Zurich office. Most importantly, I visited my former dream school, ETH, especially Einstein’s locker, completing a kind of pilgrimage. Next time, if there is a chance, I will go to the southern Alpine region.

The United States

The BGM here should be Dvorak’s From the New World. The last time I heard this piece was in freshman year, in the elective course “Appreciation of Western Music.” At that time I did not have enough knowledge and did not quite understand its expression. Now, on American soil, listening to it again and again, I can better feel its love and praise for the New World. Although it was composed at the end of the 19th century, today’s America has already doubled in age, and 2026 will be its 250th anniversary.

Unlike the Old World, the New World is not a nation-state. It was built through consensus. It is similar to BTC: all value lies in the consensus between people, not in separation of powers or a written constitution. Many countries copied separation of powers and still fell into dictatorship.

It needs to be emphasized that this consensus is “freedom,” not “democracy.”

I went to the United States once and visited several large cities in the Northeast: New York, Washington, Philadelphia, and Boston. As a developed country, the United States is indeed far more developed than Europe. There is a lot of infrastructure, roads are packed with traffic, and cars are huge, basically SUVs by default. Europe’s popular small cars are rare in America. Europoor really lives up to the name. Driving in America is still wild, even wilder than in China. Many cars with smashed doors, fronts, and rears are still running on the road. In Ireland, drivers are generally humble, lanes are also very narrow, mostly single-lane roads, and infrastructure is much worse than in China and the US.

Interestingly, in many states I visited, license plates are mandatory only at the back, and many people do not hang front plates. Quite a few turn signals are red, and are not easy to distinguish from position lights and brake lights. I do not know why they are not required to be yellow like in other places, which would be more recognizable.

The Statue of Liberty is truly a huge IP, comparable to the Eiffel Tower in Paris. It was indeed also built by Eiffel. The X-Men fought on it, and in the first Allied mission of Red Alert, Tanya also witnessed its destruction. All films and TV shows involving European immigration to America in the 19th and early 20th centuries show the classic scene of new immigrants entering the harbor by ship and seeing the Statue of Liberty, such as The Legend of 1900, The Godfather, and Titanic. And of course Spider-Man; the game is basically a New York tourism simulator.

I gained a deep understanding of Manhattan distance. When I was in Beijing, because of urban planning, I already felt the roads were quite regular, running due south-north and due east-west. Manhattan is strictly laid out as rectangles, similar to Chang’an in the Tang dynasty, with blocks for wards and markets. I also deeply understood those city skyline problems on LeetCode.

I also watched the extremely popular musical Hamilton on Broadway, and it really lived up to its reputation. It tells the story of the Founding Fathers through rappers. Most actors are Black, and their musical talent matches the form perfectly. The main Founding Fathers are played by Black actors, which also witnesses America’s inclusiveness and political correctness, without any sense of incongruity.

I touched the Wall Street bull and prayed for A-shares [laugh]. In front of the NYSE, I looked at US stocks. At that time the S&P 500 was already almost at 5,800 points.

I visited the World Trade Center, which felt somewhat like Beijing’s Guomao. The decoration is very nice, and the stores are high-end and classy. There was also the 9/11 Memorial. From it and from many later historical developments, one can see the profound impact and changes that 9/11 brought to America and the world.

Some New York subway stations are designed badly. Only after paying to enter do you discover that you need to take the train in the opposite direction, but changing directions requires exiting the station. In that case, if you miss your stop, you also have to exit the station before taking the train back.

I also walked around the world’s largest Chinatown in Lower Manhattan. The location is very good, and it lives up to its reputation. No wonder Detective Chinatown 2 chose New York. It has a long history, large scale, and many remnants of the old dynasty.

There is also the new Chinatown in Flushing, which is even more exaggerated. In Chinatowns elsewhere, signs are bilingual in Chinese and the local language. In Flushing’s Chinatown, there is only Chinese.

The EU is now treated the same as CN: Apple Intelligence cannot be used. It works once you get to the US. The EU is really too weak now. It is not good at other things, but world-class at regulation and legislation, obstructing innovation and economic development to this extent.

Washington, DC, was truly stunning. If New York symbolizes capitalism, Washington symbolizes the US Constitution. The Lincoln Memorial, Washington Monument, Capitol, Supreme Court, and White House. Much history I had read in books became connected to reality.

For example, the elder’s quotation: “of the people, by the people, for the people.”

The Capitol also has very friendly free guided tours. Visitors enter the Senate and House areas for civic education (of course separated somewhat from office areas, but only by a simple line: lawmakers walk inside, visitors outside), learning about the founding system and history, and being told about citizens’ powers and government powers.

Of course the United States also has many shortcomings. Many are actually two sides of the same coin, a double-edged sword. For example, its relatively extreme liberalism. Although liberalism has declined since the Great Depression, it remains the freest among developed countries. This brings economic growth, talent concentration, and innovation, but also relatively weak social security, large wealth gaps, and a lot of gun violence.

I personally still admire liberalism more. I will discuss it later.

Status

I have been in Ireland for two years and have also obtained permanent residency, Stamp 4. Ireland can be said to be very friendly toward immigration and status. I have not seen another country with such friendly conditions. Perhaps it is also because it lacks people.

On the work permit occupation list, slaughterhouse workers (because animal husbandry is developed), hospitals, IT, and accounting are all among the top occupations.

By nationality, Indians are the most numerous, accounting for one quarter, followed by Brazil, India, Turkey, Egypt, and many others. Chinese are counted under Other (5%), and Ireland is not a popular immigration destination for ethnic Chinese. There are not many Chinese people in Ireland. Chinese people still like going to traditional old imperialist countries: the United States, Canada/Australia, Britain, and France.

Ireland issues 20,000 to 40,000 work permits each year, which is quite a lot for a country of five million people. Beyond that, many people from the UK and EU come to work, and they do not need work permits. Although inflow is large, outflow is also large. Most people stay a few years and then leave, treating Ireland as a stepping stone. Because job opportunities here are good, and there are many multinational corporations. Many Europeans come here for a resume boost and then leave.

As for people from the third world, many also leave after obtaining status. Among programmers, many people have an American dream: they have already gone, are going, or will go to the US to work. Although US status is hard to obtain, that is mainly for China and India, the two populous countries. For people from other countries, it is still quite fast.

Although the Republic of Ireland has a main ethnic group, the Irish people (Celts and Gaels), it is still a very ancient people who migrated from continental Europe. In other places, such as the European continent and Britain, Gaels were long ago replaced by new peoples such as Latins, Anglo-Saxons, and Germans; now only Ireland and Scotland still have them. Historically they also experienced many hardships and barely survived until today. This is also a natural process in biological evolution. Similar ethnic replacement exists on many other continents. Famous examples include the Ainu of Hokkaido, the Austronesians surviving in Pacific gaps, and the Native Americans of North America. The Irish are relatively lucky, surviving on the margins, and in the past two centuries spreading both actively and passively. Now there are 70 million people of Irish descent overseas, such as Biden. By contrast, the island itself has only 7 million people, including Northern Ireland, and 15% are foreigners. In Dublin especially, half the people are foreigners. Foreigners mainly live in cities. Ireland’s rapid economic growth in recent decades also owes something to immigration, similar to how more than half the people in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen are from elsewhere.

When working abroad, status is actually the most important thing. It mainly means freedom and risk resistance.

Liberalism and Conservatism

This year I subscribed to YouTube Premium and listened to all four seasons of Luo Zhenyu’s Luoji Siwei, perhaps 200 hours. Luo Pang is very skilled and excellent at summarizing other people’s knowledge and outputting viewpoints. Liberalism and conservatism are what he supports. In particular, episode 83: Did He Really Save America? directly criticizes Roosevelt’s New Deal and Keynesianism, partly rehabilitates Hoover, and fully rehabilitates the liberal market economy.

I also read Nassim Taleb’s Antifragile. Of course it contains many views, and liberalism is also what he promotes.

Growing up in a socialist country, the Party manages everything. The government, as a paternal authority, takes care of and controls everyone in every possible way. Although things have loosened a lot compared with the Mao era, there is still plenty. I did not experience the earlier era myself, so I cannot personally feel family planning, the Great Leap Forward, or the Cultural Revolution, but during the three pandemic years I was basically all in China, “enjoying” extreme unfreedom.

Of course, many compatriots are willing to exchange freedom for security. But everyone has their own aspirations; vote with your feet.

Combining this with Wu Xiaobo’s The Gains and Losses of Economic Changes in the Past Dynasties, freedom is also a prerequisite for economic development. As the saying goes, “tighten control and everything dies; loosen control and everything lives; once it lives, it becomes chaotic.”

Ireland is actually quite free, but high taxes are a major drawback. For many ambitious talents, many still go to regions with higher income and lower taxes, such as the United States, the Middle East, Singapore, and Switzerland. Of course, according to the theory of the “veil of ignorance,” a welfare society is also an advantage. If you did not know your starting configuration before birth, you would certainly prefer a welfare state.

The World Situation

The Republic of Ireland inherited Britain’s political system, namely parliamentary democracy. At the end of this year it also held a general election. The center-right Fine Gael and Fianna Fail continued forming a coalition government. Compared with many countries in the world, the political situation is quite stable. Of course, the biggest reason should be that the economy has kept developing steadily, and everyone can benefit, so contradictions are not as sharp.

This summer, I also closely observed and participated in Ireland’s local elections and voting activities, intentionally cultivating my civic awareness. The local council representative election happens once every five years, similar to county people’s congress representatives. You only need an address and tax number; citizenship is not required. Voting at the same time was the European Parliament election, which does require EU citizenship. The last time I voted was many years ago, for Haidian District people’s congress representatives. Of course, local councils have little power. They usually decide how local tax funds, mainly property tax, are spent, such as building schools and libraries, these livelihood matters.

Candidate posters were hanging everywhere on roadside lamp posts. I also received many campaign leaflets in the mailbox. The polling station in the district was a primary school. On the ballot, you fill in 1, 2, 3… according to your level of support. You can fill all of them or stop at any number. The voting process is: first, campaigning begins about a month in advance, with candidate portraits on lamp posts and leaflets in mailboxes. Voters must register online or offline first, obtain eligibility, and receive an election card with an assigned number. On election day, from 7:00 to 20:00, voters go to their district polling station, show identity documents and the election card, or simply report the number on it. Staff find your name on the register, cross it out, and give you a ballot, punching it by machine to show it is an issued ballot. Then there is a voting area with partitions, and you use the pencils provided there to fill in numbers. Finally you put the ballot into the ballot box.

I had several feelings about so-called democracy:

  1. The right to be elected is more important than the right to vote. Candidates include various parties and quite a few independents. Qualification to stand for election is very simple, without review or approval. It is a competitive election, not a single-candidate confirmation election.
  2. Rule of law protects freedom; democracy depends on freedom. I have to say, the socialist core values are far ahead.
  3. Civil society depends on tradition and inheritance. It needs to be cultivated, educated, and maintained. This is the foundation of rule of law, democracy, and freedom. Liberia and Haiti copied the American system, but had only the appearance and not the substance, and therefore did not develop well. Citizens’ democratic and rights consciousness is far more important than a simple democratic process.

Many countries and regions around the world also held elections this year. Britain turned left, while other countries turned right. Of course, the one everyone paid most attention to was the US election, with Trump achieving “unified control of all three branches.” I am still quite confident in American checks and balances. Historically, Washington had the greatest prestige to become emperor. Roosevelt also greatly expanded federal government power, achieved unified control, and even broke the two-term norm, serving until death. Recently I have been reading Luo Pang’s recommended The Glory and the Dream, which tells the history of American presidents after 1932. The resilience of the American system is still strong. Roosevelt’s prestige was unprecedented, with surging public opinion. Some citizens were even willing to burn down the Congress that constrained him (of course they did not actually do it, unlike the 2021 Capitol riot). Later, after elections, both chambers were also controlled by Democrats, while the Supreme Court still struck down many bills. By the time the Supreme Court was also controlled by Democrats, many years had already passed. Yet there were still internal Democratic Party constraints and limits from states’ rights. After Roosevelt died, Congress quickly passed a constitutional amendment explicitly limiting presidential terms. This also means Trump 2.0 is already his final term. In terms of democracy, the United States does not rank very high in indices such as The Economist’s Democracy Index. But in terms of freedom and checks and balances, the US is definitely among the top.

Europeans may also pay some attention to the European Parliament election in the middle of the year, where the right won quite a few seats.

Beyond that, wars and conflicts continued.

The Russia-Ukraine war is in its third year and remains deadlocked. But I heard that after Trump takes office he will require Ukraine and Russia to make peace.

The Israel-Palestine conflict is also entering its second year. Hamas has been mostly destroyed, and Hezbollah in Lebanon and Iran have also suffered retaliation. Palestine is truly miserable. The current international order can be called broken: fists work better than reason. Israel also seized this opportunity and struck hard. Everyone else is too busy with themselves, and Europe remains at the level of verbal support. With Ukraine before, it was a reenactment of the classic appeasement policy before World War II.

Syria’s Assad also collapsed in an instant. The opposition forces advanced almost unopposed, probably because they caught a good timing. Domestic and international conditions were both favorable. Internationally, Russia, which supported Assad, was bogged down in war; Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon had been too overwhelmed by Israeli retaliation to look after themselves. Domestically, 50 years of Assad father-and-son rule had long lost popular support, and the economy had never recovered. How the new government will be established, and how Syria will be rebuilt and restored, can only be watched next year.

At the end of the year, South Korea staged the Russian script of a president declaring martial law and sending troops to dissolve the National Assembly. In the 30 years since the Republic of Korea democratized, democracy has indeed taken root in people’s hearts, and this script had a different ending. The army surrounded the National Assembly but allowed lawmakers to enter. Lawmakers voted to abolish the martial law order, and the army withdrew. Six hours later, the president also announced the cancellation of the martial law that already existed in name only. The latest development is that the president has been impeached and suspended, awaiting the Constitutional Court’s ruling. I suspect he will not escape prison in the end.

However, my attention to news is actually useless. It is only out of interest. I remain very optimistic about the future, with unprecedented confidence in human civilization. Historically speaking, today’s global turmoil is not especially severe. It can even be counted as a relatively good era, comparable to Europe’s golden age from 1848 to 1914, dominated by peace, economic development, continuous technological breakthroughs, and considerable improvements in people’s living standards. Everything develops exponentially, and according to the principle of compound interest, the momentum is unstoppable. AI is in full swing, and SpaceX’s Starship is also exciting. Humanity has developed to a Kardashev scale civilization level of 0.7. I am quite optimistic about future development toward Type I, Type II, and Type III.

Liu Cixin once said, “Give civilization to time, not time to civilization.” But as a member of human civilization, I still hope to give civilization more time. (This reminds me that Netflix also released a new 3 Body Problem series this year, and I wrote some thoughts: Thoughts on Netflix’s 3 Body Problem: Question Cheng Xin, Understand Cheng Xin, Become Cheng Xin.)

Investing

Like last year, this year was again full of stock-picking gods everywhere. The broad market alone rose 26%, repeatedly hitting new all-time highs and reaching 6,000 points.

At the beginning of the year I read Walter Isaacson’s Elon Musk, and it was indeed exciting. I bought 10 shares of TSLA at a cost basis of 190. It fell as low as 160, and I eventually sold at 260. I guess I sold too early. Within a month, after the US election, TSLA took off, reaching as high as 460 and now still around 430. The volatility is huge. Without blind faith, one indeed cannot hold it. I do not have the fate of sudden wealth. I also bought very little, basically with a playful mentality.

This year I continued following the advice of Just Keep Buying and went all in on the S&P 500. Faith in broad-market indices is relatively easy to build, especially because I am interested in history and technology, and therefore have great confidence in human civilization. The fundamental growth driver behind the S&P 500 is still the accelerating improvement of human productivity and the long-term compound development of the economy.

CN also had the 924 market rally. Netizens joked that it went directly from ICU with a shot of adrenaline to dancing in a nightclub. Like many people, I took advantage of this short policy bull market and gradually cleared out both A-shares and Chinese concept stocks. I had bought the Chinese concept stock index for three years, and finally broke even. Of course, counting time cost, it was still quite a loss. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq I bought during the same period had already risen 70%. In A-shares I also bought CSI 300 and some industry indices. The principal was not large. I exited with a small loss and will never play with Myanmar A-shares again.

Better not touch non-free-market economies. Let others play. Believe in national destiny; cherish physical and mental health.

When I went abroad, 1 euro equaled 6.8 RMB. Now 1 EUR = 7.8 CNY. I regret not exchanging more in 2022. At that time I did not have a very complete future plan. Many things were uncertain, and the risk was quite high.

Only last year did I slowly plan out the next few years of life, with ideas such as buying a home and buying a car, and no plan to return to China for development in the next few years.

2025 Outlook

Go home. I have been on this island of Ireland for two years and still have not gone home, for various reasons, always delaying it. When I left, it was still during the three-year pandemic lockdown period, and I was mentally prepared not to return for many years. As a result, the situation changed too quickly. I left during the darkest hour before dawn.

I also obtained an entry permit for Taiwan and plan to visit the treasure island of Taiwan Province on the way. It happens that I am attending the wedding of a Taiwanese friend in Ireland. Traveling ten thousand miles, Taiwan is indeed quite distinctive and worth visiting and experiencing. As a child I grew up listening to Jay Chou, watching Hunan TV’s Golden Eagle Theater with my family, including It Started with a Kiss, You Are the Apple of My Eye, and various idol youth dramas. Some people call it the “light of the Chinese-speaking world,” realizing the “socialist core values,” and its customs and culture are very distinctive.

Get an Irish driver’s license. This whole journey of getting a license has been so bumpy that I find it hard to believe. I have taken the road test four times, failing each time for various reasons. Next year I will continue. Although “the first attempt is full of energy, the second declines, and the third is exhausted,” next year I will restart in Ireland. Fighting! I refuse to believe I cannot pass.

Keep exercising. After buying a home, I am farther from the office and no longer go there often, so I can no longer freeload the office gym. I got a membership at the gym in the nearby shopping center, 35 euros a month, and go three times a week. Continue next year.

In my career, I hope there can be progress and a better turn. In the previous two years, because of layoffs and reorgs, things were quite turbulent. In 2024, the economic environment clearly improved, and the company started hiring again, so I survived into a better time. In the second half of this year, I transferred back to my old US group. Although it is a great pity that my former manager retired early, it is still much better than the Israeli group last year. I rebuilt trust with the new manager, who was also a former colleague, and work is proceeding steadily, with some impact. Continue next year.

In life, I hope I can go out more, meet different people, and participate in more social activities. In the second half of this year I moved into my new home, with no housemates. I also basically work from home, fully living the life of a Japanese young male homebody living alone. Even as a 70% introvert, I cannot quite handle it.