Blog
Hardware Wallets Comparison (Trezor, BitBox02, Ledger, Coldcard)
Practicing self-custody comes with the burden of picking the right hardware wallet. That evaluation is highly personal journey, as the circumstances and needs vary from person to person. In this post, I show you my thought process and requirements. Below, you can find a comparison between a few of the industry-standard hardware wallets and my conclusions. …
Sticking to a Strategy (Notes From the 2020 Recession)
I wrote this post for a discontinued blog during the market crash of March 2020, before the Covid recession was officially announced. I decided to republish it on dpetkovski.com because it’s evergreen content – it gives unique insights into the mind of a retail investor during market turmoil. And the thought process should be applicable …
Taxes for Dummies – How Tax Works?
Recently I published multiple posts about different types of taxes and their treatment per country. People with similar interests reached out and we’ve had extremely insightful discussions. But I also received questions from beginners that motivated me to write a more general introduction. This post assumes that the reader has absolutely no previous knowledge about …
Linear vs Annuity Mortgage (The Netherlands)
Many expats in the Netherlands aren’t sure whether to get a linear mortgage or an annuity mortgage. In this post, I will explain the differences between linear vs annuity mortgages. This will allow you to avoid overspending on a cookie-cutter solution from a financial advisor. Annuity Mortgage Annuity mortgage is the most common type of mortgage in the …
Conservative Predictions During Bear Markets
As a crypto historian, I wanted to take a look at the sentiment of market participants before previous bull runs. The TLDR is: investors are way too conservative during bear markets. Price Predictions From 2016 Here is a Reddit thread from 2016 where users discuss Ether’s price: End of 2016 and 2017 price target, place your …
Investment Costs with Dutch Banks (Full Comparison)
Investing through the Dutch banks is quite popular with investors from the Netherlands. This is mostly due to the ability for automatic periodic investments and tax optimization through the Northern Trust Funds. In this post, I’ll compare the costs of “the Big 3” Dutch banks: ING Bank, ABN Amro, and Rabobank. Assumptions: the Type of Investor …
Inflation Explained
I’ll start with a story from 2014. A friend from Macedonia started an interesting discussion – how much money a person would need to stop relying on a salary: “In our country”, he said, “you can live comfortably on €400 per month, which is less than €5k per year. Multiply that by 40 (years), and …
Net-Worth Taxation in Europe (EU Wealth Taxes)
Net-worth based taxation (AKA wealth tax) is becoming more common in Europe, and especially in the EU. In this post, I’ll cover all countries in Europe that implement wealth taxes and rough approximations of the rates and conditions. If you’re interested in a more general European taxation post, I covered all investment taxes in all …
Opportunity Cost With a Twist
Opportunity Cost is the cost associated with foregone opportunities. Most of the time when we make a decision, we pick one of multiple mutually exclusive options. Although people usually consider the risks and returns of the chosen option, many tend to neglect the potential rewards of the alternatives. And it makes sense, as a person is …
Yield Conversion – HPY, EAY, BDY, MMY, BEY (Convert Easily)
This post is the ultimate lesson on conversion between different yield representations: Holding Period Yield (HPY) Effective Annual Yield (EAY) Bank Discount Yield (BDY) Money Market Yield (MMY) Bond Equivalent Yield (BEY) So, whether you ended up here because you want to learn more about the different yield representations, need help with a specific yield …
5 Steps to Overcome Investing Fear
You’ll never self-actualize if you allow fear to subdue you into paralyzing risk-aversion. This post won’t necessarily show you where to start, but it will clearly show you why you’re in the position you’re in. Follow the 5 levels below and figure out the decisive factor that prevents you to employ your past productivity (i.e. …
VTSAX in Europe?
If you’re an aspiring investor from the EU, you most probably researched whether you can buy $VTSAX in Europe. And I can see why – the fund contains over 4000 companies from all market caps for the incredibly low expense ratio of just 0.04%. Since it’s the go-to approach for many passive investors from the …
Recession Predictions vs Economists & the Media
“Economists predicted 9 of the last 4 recessions.” People often get obsessed with predictions and live in continuous fear of a market collapse. This is my attempt to convince you that uncertainty is normal. As someone that strategically invests since 2017, I know how to filter out the noise and sleep comfortably with a 7 …
Is Ledger a Hot Wallet? Analysis of the Recovery Service
Ledger used to be the standard hardware wallet choice for most crypto investors. Some time ago, they announced Ledger Recover. It’s an optional service aimed at n00bs that don’t trust themselves to take care of their seed phrase. If you were a Ledger user with significant capital secured by it when this news came out, …
How I Accumulate Bitcoin During Bear Markets
This post can be summarized really simply: “I buy as much Bitcoin as I can during bear markets”. However, evolving in the market, besides just buying, I found an edge that I’ve leveraged successfully in the past and I’m doing it again now. You can consider this post an intro to making mad gains without …