#investing

4 summaries

How European ETF Investors Can Cut Fees and Keep More of Their Returns

European ETF investors often overpay in fees without realizing how dramatically that compounds over time — a 0.15% annual difference can cost over €115,000 on a €100,000 investment across 40 years. This guide breaks down why certain ETFs like those using Solactive's flat-fee licensing model can offer structurally lower costs, and how that advantage grows as fund assets increase. Covering global, developed market, emerging market, US, and European ETF categories, it identifies the lowest-cost qualifying options in each segment along with key selection criteria. It also warns against reflexively switching funds for marginally lower fees, highlighting the tax consequences that can easily outweigh years of savings.

Sep 1, 2025Angelo Colombo🇬🇧🇵🇱🇷🇺🇺🇦

You Are Your Own Main Asset: How to Calculate and Grow Your Personal Value

This post argues that the most valuable asset any person owns is themselves, and offers a simple formula — monthly income × 12 months × working years — to put a number on it. It breaks down the five key factors that drive personal value: age and remaining working life, the country you live and earn in, income stability, mental and physical health, and your realistic prospects for raising earnings. Along the way it makes the case for changing a job you hate rather than chasing speculation, seeking bonus-based pay that aligns your interests with clients and employers, and passing your value on through books, teaching, and knowledge transfer. The core takeaway: investing starts with investing in yourself, and your value keeps growing as long as you keep creating value for others.

Oct 18, 2024HUGS.FUND🇬🇧🇵🇱🇷🇺🇺🇦

Howard Marks on Risk: Why Asymmetry, Not Volatility, Defines Great Investing

Howard Marks argues that risk is the ultimate test of investing skill, and that it is the probability of permanent loss — not volatility — that investors should fear. He explains why risk cannot be quantified before or even after the fact, why it is perverse and hidden (rising as prices climb and falling as they drop), and why no asset is so good it can't be overpriced. Drawing on analogies from car insurance, life insurance, soccer and backgammon, Marks lays out how disciplined investors knowingly take, analyze, diversify and get paid for risk. The core lesson: don't avoid risk, manage it — and pursue the asymmetry of capturing gains in rising markets while losing less when they fall.

Sep 12, 2024Oaktree🇬🇧🇵🇱🇷🇺🇺🇦

The Equation That Changed Finance: How Physicists Cracked the Market

This post traces the surprising scientific lineage of modern finance, from Louis Bachelier's random walk theory and Einstein's work on Brownian motion to Ed Thorp's card counting and the Black-Scholes-Merton equation that launched the derivatives boom. It explains how options work, why stock prices behave like balls falling through a Galton board, and how dynamic hedging lets traders manufacture near-riskless portfolios. It also examines the trillion-dollar markets that grew from a single formula, their role in both providing liquidity and amplifying crashes, and how Jim Simons' Medallion Fund used hidden Markov models and machine learning to beat the market for decades. The story ends with a paradox: the more patterns we find and trade away, the closer markets come to pure randomness.

Apr 8, 2024Vert Dider🇬🇧🇵🇱🇷🇺🇺🇦