Hi I'm a beginner with 20k savings currently serving NS, how much should I allocate for emergency funds and how much to invest?

I had the same question before.

The answer is..... It depends.

If you are planning to pay off your student loan (for uni) with that money, I would not recommend investing. But if you are lucky enough not to be burdened by student debt. Sure.

For investing:
5K as an emergency fund should be good enough. But you would still need to ensure that you have sufficient holding power (insurance and some income assets) before investing.

For student loan:
Recommend that you keep the money in a high-interest savings account or short-term endowment so that you can pay your student loan immediately when you graduate. (this is cos bank loan rates are at around 5%)

It will be good to take a look at your current expenditures, and see how much the necessary spendings are (e.g. food, transport) and take a multiple of 3 to 6 months, with the duration depending on whether u have dependents or any long term obligations (e.g. education loan, etc)

assuming that your expenses are relatively covered, perhaps allocating a greater proportion to investment may help to generate more passive income... however this depends on ur risk appetite as well

personally, one factor to consider when making these investment is the ease of using the platform aside from the liquidity, the returns might differ depending on the volatile market conditions but personally i prefer etfs that track market index like s&p 500 or sti​​​