Category: Investing
Liquid Staking Tokens vs Liquid Restaking Tokens (LST vs LRT)
If you recently started venturing the depths of DeFi, you might need help understanding LSTs and LRTs. In order to describe these intermediate concepts, we need to start at the beginning. This is a n00b-friendly introduction to liquid staking and liquid restaking. What is Proof of Stake? Proof of Stake (PoS) is a consensus mechanism …
Rebalancing – Managing Your Investment Portfolio
Rebalancing means redistributing your wealth across different investments, in order to match your target allocation. Understanding asset allocation is crucial in order to understand the need for rebalancing. So if you still haven’t, make sure to read this post: Asset Allocation. Rebalancing Explained Rebalancing usually happens on frequent intervals or when the target asset allocation drastically …
Core Stock Portfolio for EU Investors (ETF Selection & Tips)
If you’re investing from Europe, you most probably spent a lot of time researching ETFs and determining your asset allocation. And given the plethora of investment strategies and products you can choose from, it’s easy to get overwhelmed, especially as a beginner. In this post, I’ll cover how a European investor’s core portfolio might look …
IWDA vs VWCE and VWRL (For European Investors)
Building a one-fund portfolio is quite popular with European investors. That’s why the questions of IWDA vs VWCE or IWDA vs VWRL pop up quite often. Both IWDA and VWCE/VWRL are part of DeGiro’s core selection of ETFs (traded free of charge), which makes them even more popular for smaller investors in the EU. In …
5 Common Crypto Scams
With crypto summer emerging, the scammers are back with their old bag of tricks. This post is a n00b-friendly introduction to the most common crypto scams you should be aware of. Note: even if you self-custody, that’s not protection against lack of common sense. Having control of your coins makes you your own bank, i.e. …
The Best Emerging Market ETF for Europeans
Including an emerging market ETF in your portfolio is a great way to increase diversification, especially because of their lower correlation with developed markets ETFs. If you already invest in IWDA or you’re not happy with the internal allocation of VWCE, you might want to add an emerging market ETF to your portfolio. I’ll list a few options that …
Asset Allocation – Finding Your Ideal Distribution
Asset allocation is a wealth distribution strategy. It represents the way an investor’s portfolio is divided into different investments. Determining the asset allocation is one of the most important decisions an investor needs to make before deploying capital in any investment. Examples of Asset Allocation Let’s say an investor is exposed to the following asset classes: …
Market Efficiency (Efficient Market Hypothesis)
Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH) is the hypothesis that securities trade at their fair value i.e. their prices reflect all currently known information. In this post, I’ll explain how we determine if a market is efficient or not, in a beginner-friendly manner. Basically, it’s a matter of how fast trading activity reflects new information in prices. …
The 4 Year Cycle – Bitcoin Price Prediction 📈
“The 4 Year Cycle” is one of the most important posts you’ll ever read. I mean it. People that understood the cyclical nature of the markets will never struggle financially. In this post, I’ll explain the single most relevant indicator for Bitcoin’s price and how I used it to build a position with full conviction. …
Index Investing & Index Funds – A Gentle Introduction
Index Investing represents an investment strategy which aims to track the performance of a market index. Not “picking winning stocks”, not “timing the market”, not “beating the market”. This strategy is synonymous with matching the market – at least the one you choose to match. Index Funds An index fund is a special type of an …
The Death of the Gold Standard – The Aftermath (Part 2)
In my previous post on this topic, I wrote about events in recent history that lead to the death of the gold standard. I’ll do a short recap and jump into the aftermath – what’s been going on after we went off the gold standard. The Gold Standard: Modern History These are the major events …
Stock Market Index – Explanation and Examples
After publishing my post on ETFs I received many questions about how to approach picking one. Understanding stock market indices is crucial for this. In this post, I’ll cover what is an index and how to use one for your investment strategies. What is a Stock Market Index? Directly from Investopedia: A market index is …
CSPX vs VUSA vs IUSA – My Thoughts
A US ETF is usually the core of most investors’ portfolios. For Europeans, the questions of CSPX vs VUSA or VUSA vs IUSA often pop up. In this post, I’ll do my best to answer the trilemma and give my recommendation. CSPX Ticker symbols: CSPX, SXR8, CSP1; ISIN: IE00B5BMR087 CSPX (iShares Core S&P 500 UCITS …
Obstacles to Efficiency – Taxes, Price Controls, Trade Restrictions
Welcome to the third and last post of the Supply and Demand Series. The first two posts described the self-regulatiing nature of the free markets and their efficiency in maximizing revenue and benefit to society. In this post, I’ll talk about government intervention and regulation. Specifically, how government impositions make the markets less efficient by …
Bitcoin Block Reward Halving (Explanation & Price Impact)
The block reward halving is one of the key characteristics of Bitcoin. It’s extremely relevant both for ideologists and investors, so make sure to understand it. Introduction to Bitcoin Block Rewards All Bitcoin transactions are grouped into blocks, which are added to the blockchain through a process called mining. Each Bitcoin miner tries to be the fastest one to …