It can be difficult sharing a portfolio, especially as early on I made a lot of bad investments. I wish to share my portfolio in the hope that you can learn from my mistakes, but also see how I have been able to grow my portfolio consistently over the years.
My portfolio is distributed between investments in my own name, investments through different companies that I own and through my own private pension.
I will breakdown each year one by one, showing firstly how the capital grew in the period and secondly how the capital is distrubuted between the various asset classes for the period.
2017
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I started my first investment in December 2017, by investing €500 in a private pension. This was my only investment in 2017.
2018
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My goal in 2018 was to build a portfolio of €46,000 saving roughly €3,500 per month.
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My first major investment was a €17,500 investment in a forestry company that grows Christmas Trees. The investment is broken down into two agreements, with the first agreement due to be settled in January 2020, and the second in April 2023. One mistake I made with this investment, is I should have invested less as my portfolio has been badly balanced for a long time as I didn't diversify enough when making this investment.
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From May 2018 I invested in several forex scams. These included an investment in Blue Trading, which was a trading company offering high risk returns of between 15-20% per month. I fell for the scam and continued to add more capital into Blue Trading. Thankfully, I eventually worked out it was a Ponzi Scheme and pulled my money and profit out. The majority of my profit for 2018 came from Blue Trading.
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I also invested in another forex scam called Algotechs. Algotechs went bust in early 2019 and I lost around €4,000. While this was a bad loss at the time, I learned a lot about the forex industry because of Algotechs.
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By mid 2018 I also started investing in peer to peer lending platforms. The platforms the majority of my peer to peer capital is in is: Mintos.
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Also in mid 2018, I purchased shares in Mclowd, an Australian based start up providing accounting services for self administered pensions. They were a client of mine in my web development business and this was my first investment in a private company.
Investment Summary for 2018
| 31st Dec 2018 |
| Opening Balance |
€500.00 |
| Capital Introduced |
€36,951.50 |
| P2P Lending Interest Income |
€237.19 |
| Forex Trading Income |
€5,634.78 |
| Equities Capital Gain |
-€126.69 |
| Capital Gain of shares in Private Company |
€2,145.49 |
| Forestry Capital Gain |
€2,750.00 |
| Closing Balance |
€48,092.27 |
Asset Allocation as of 31st December 2018
| 31st Dec 2018 |
| Peer to Peer Lending |
€10,361.45 |
21.54% |
| Shares & Equities |
€5,873.31 |
12.21% |
| Business Venture Equity (Start Up Investments) |
€4,090.13 |
8.50% |
| Trading Capital |
€4,457.38 |
9.27% |
| Forestry |
€20,250.00 |
42.11% |
| Cash |
€3,060.00 |
6.36% |
| Total |
€48,092.27 |
100% |
2019
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My goal in 2019 was to double my portfolio to €92,000.
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I initially lost capital in February due to Algotechs being a scam and blowing up my managed trading account. I recovered some of this loss by investing with an Irish Trader who returned 25% for the year.
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I launched my own forex trading company and poured capital into that business. The business uses any capital to trade the markets.
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I paid off a personal loan by borrowing against my portfolio. It was a win:win situation as I am now my own creditor and am paying off the loan monthly at a tax free interest rate of 6%. Because this loan was for an extension for our home, it has been assigned as a Property asset. Listen to how I went about setting this up here.
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I set up a second pension and started investing €1,000 per month into a low cost international index fund. My Pension Advisor is Ralph Benson from Moneycube, who I would highly recommend.
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At the end of 2019, I made the decision to stop investing so heavily into my investment portfolio because I wanted to work less hours. I still plan to add €12,000 into my pension in 2020.
Investment Summary for 2019
| 31st Dec 2019 |
| Opening Balance |
€48,092.27 |
| Capital Introduced |
€36,562.48 |
| P2P Lending Interest Income |
€3,257.41 |
| Forex Trading Income |
-€2,149.90 |
| Equities Capital Gain |
€1,989.49 |
| Capital Gain of shares in Private Company |
€67.03 |
| Forestry Capital Gain |
€4,375.00 |
| Closing Balance |
€92,193.78 |
Asset Allocation as of 31st December 2019
| 31st Dec 2019 |
| Peer to Peer Lending |
€16,745.21 |
18.16% |
| Shares & Equities |
€15,739.15 |
17.07% |
| Business Venture Equity (Start Up Investments) |
€8,415.20 |
9.13% |
| Property |
€14,108.65 |
15.30% |
| Trading Capital |
€11,635.54 |
12.62% |
| Forestry |
€24,625.00 |
26.71% |
| Cash |
€925.03 |
1.00% |
| Total |
€92,193.78 |
100% |
2020
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In early January 2020, I lost €6,000 by over leveraging my trading account. It was a huge learning curve and I have since stopped trading my own capital.
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In late Febuary 2020, Envestio (a peer to peer lending platform in Eastern Europe) disappeared overnight. All indiciations suggest it was a scam. I wrote off the capital from my portfolio and lost ~€1,600.
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Also in late Febuary 2020, one of the agreements from the Christmas tree investment I made in early 2018 matured. I looked to use the money to purchase my own forestry land and this lead to me exploring the idea of forming a co-op to plant native trees.
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In April 2020, Grupeer (Europe's second biggest peer to peer lending platform) indicated cashflow issues due to COVID-19. Once investigations were made by investors, there were several fake loan originators. All indiciations suggest Grupeer is a scam. I wrote off the capital from my portfolio and lost ~€4,500.
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In April 2020, I purchased shares in Gone West, a private UK company which is helping plant native trees. I am working with them directly to help them establish forestry land in Ireland.
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In June 2020, we looked to establish a more traditional portfolio of property and equities (index funds). We moved a large allocation of our portfolio back to cash in preparation of purchasing an investment property. We have since put down a deposit on a new property and are hoping to have the keys for the property by September.
Investment Summary for 2020
| As At: 25th July 2020 |
| Opening Balance |
€92,193.78 |
| Capital Introduced |
€10,133.01 |
| P2P Lending Interest Income |
-€5,551.31 |
| Forex Trading Income |
-€4,619.82 |
| Equities Capital Gain |
€360.27 |
| Forestry Capital Gain |
€750.00 |
| Cryptocurrency Capital Gain |
€6.42 |
| Closing Balance |
€93,272.35 |
Asset Allocation as of 25th July 2020
| 25th July 2020 |
| Peer to Peer Lending |
€4,752.87 |
5.10% |
| Shares & Equities |
€24,371.14 |
26.13% |
| Business Venture Equity (Start Up Investments) |
€14,157.16 |
15.18% |
| Property |
€17,246.37 |
18.49% |
| Forestry |
€10,375.00 |
11.12% |
| Cryptocurrency |
€92.31 |
0.10% |
| Cash |
€22,277.50 |
23.88% |
| Total |
€93,272.35 |
100% |