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$AMZN (-3,47%)
$SBUX (-6,28%)
$GOOG (-2,49%)
$GOOGL (-2,74%)
$NET (-9,11%)
$PLTR (-11,65%)
$VNA (-2,32%)
$META (-4,44%)
2025 - A year to forget if you look at the first quarter. While things were still looking positive until around mid-February, things have been going steadily downhill since the middle or end of February.
March 2025 was the worst single month in my portfolio since 2013, with price losses of almost 10%. The negative market trend in the US and a weak US dollar naturally hurt my portfolio particularly badly.
Monthly view:
In total, March was -9,9%. This corresponds to price losses of almost 30.000€.
The MSCI World (benchmark) was -7.9% and the S&P500 -5.8% (in dollars, for euro investors it was also more like -10%).
Winners & losers:
A look at the winners and losers shows a clear picture in March:
Winners? You will look for them almost in vain this month.
In 1st and 2nd place are Deutsche Bank
$DBK (-10%) and Allianz $ALV (-8,43%) two German financial stocks with gains of around € +180 each. Northrop Grumman $NOC (-5,33%) at +120€ is only one of 2 American stocks with a positive price performance in March.
A completely different picture on the losers' side:
1st place goes to NVIDIA $NVDA (-7,25%) with price losses of over €4,200. It is followed by Meta $META (-4,44%) and Palo Alto Networks
$PANW (-6,21%) with price losses of ~€2,000 each. 4th place goes to Alphabet
$GOOG (-2,49%) with €1,600 in share price losses. The flop 5 is then completed by a non-tech stock, namely Starbucks
$SBUX (-6,28%) with losses of ~€1,400.
The performance-neutral movements were €500 in March - these are still lower at the moment due to the house construction issue.
current year:
In the YTD my portfolio is now also clearly in the red with -8,4%. The MSCI World is still doing better at -5.4%.
In total, my portfolio currently stands at ~260.000€. This corresponds to an absolute decline of ~€25,000 in the current year 2025. -28.000€ of this comes from exchange rate losses, slightly offset by ~900€ from dividends / interest and ~2.000€ from additional investments.
Dividend:
Buying & selling:
Change of strategy?
At the moment, Donald Trump and his policies are causing a lot of scrutiny, especially with regard to the (high) US share in the portfolio.
I can understand these thoughts very well. However, I have decided not to change my strategy and to maintain my high US & tech allocation in my portfolio.
There are certainly better short-term investment opportunities (European defense stocks as an example). Through my savings plans, however, I have deliberately opted for a long-term buying strategy that I will not throw overboard every few months. In the long term, for example, 2022 was an extremely good year to buy tech stocks.
As I don't have a portfolio target for this year anyway, I'm happy to go even lower - hopefully I'll be happy about the entry prices in 2-3 years' time.
YouTube:
Unfortunately, I only uploaded 2 videos to YouTube in March. Unfortunately, work in March was extremely stressful and time-consuming, so there was little time left for this.
I have also uploaded my March portfolio update as a video there if anyone would like to see some more information on the portfolio performance: https://youtu.be/fxbvatj6uvM?si=xP_gvoEmtuqSsfz8
I'm particularly happy to receive criticism or feedback here! 😊
Goal 2025
As already mentioned in the January & February review, a fixed deposit target for this year makes little sense due to the house construction. A fixed savings rate is also difficult to implement due to the issue (unforeseen costs and the like).
A dividend target is also very difficult due to the high volatility of the US dollar.
That's why I'm focusing on other topics this year, especially building a house and possibly one or two YouTube successes.
How are things looking for you? Are you sticking to your portfolio target for 2025 or do you also see difficulties in achieving it after the first quarter?
... let's go for a coffee first ☕️
Apart from that, dividends are at least a predictable income, which at the same time enables the cash flow to continue purchasing
Have you heard about the latest developments at Starbucks $SBUX (-6,28%) heard? CEO Brian Niccol has announced that 1,100 employees will be laid off this week. This is part of a comprehensive plan to restructure the company.
In a letter to employees, Niccol explained that the layoffs are necessary to simplify the company's structure. The aim is to create less complex and more efficient teams. This decision will also affect several hundred unfilled positions worldwide.
The affected employees will continue to receive their salary and current benefits until May 2. There is also a comprehensive severance package based on the length of their employment and career planning support.
Starbucks currently employs around 361,000 people worldwide, with the majority working in stores. The planned redundancies mainly affect the 16,000 corporate employees, while the majority of in-store employees are not affected.
What do you think of the measures Starbucks is taking? Is this the right path for a successful future?
The first month of the new year is already over. While the first half of January was characterized by Trump euphoria and rising markets, the second half was much more volatile, particularly due to DeepSeek and its impact on the AI sector.
For me personally, the savings rate was unfortunately somewhat lower due to the issue of house building, as already mentioned at the end of 2024. Currently (and probably also for the coming months) it will therefore only be around €500-700.
I am aware that this is of course still a very high savings rate, but it is significantly lower than the ~€2,000 of recent years.
Also very exciting: In November, I withdrew over €20,000 from my custody account to raise the equity for the bank. Just 2 months later, my custody account is back to the same value of almost €300,000.
But now it's finally time to look at the hard figures:
In total, January was +3,9%. This corresponds to price gains of ~11.000€.
The MSCI World (benchmark) was +3.5% and the S&P500 +2.7%
Winners & losers:
A look at the winners and losers shows an unusual picture in January:
The biggest loser by far is NVIDIA! With price losses of almost €3,000, the emergence of DeepSeek caused substantial losses in the portfolio.
The other losers, on the other hand, are only worth a side note. After NVIDIA, Apple has already lost significantly less with ~€400 losses. The remaining loser stocks then only lost around €200.
On the winners' side at the top with a total of almost €2,000 in price gains is the Meta share. Followed by Bitcoin with €1,500 price gains and 2 other tech stocks: Alphabet with €1,200 and Crowdstrike with €1,000. 5th place goes to Starbucks, also with gains of almost €1,000.
The performance-neutral movements were clearly negative in January, as some of the cash was used to buy the property. The property is of course also an asset, but I would rather focus on liquid assets here.
The performance-neutral movements in relation to my portfolio were ~€600
Dividend:
Buys & Sells:
YouTube:
In mid-January, I uploaded my first video to YouTube. I am particularly proud of a video explaining my dividend strategy. The video has already reached almost 200 views and a playback time of ~10 hours!
Even though I'm still not really sure what exactly I want to do on YouTube, I really enjoy editing videos and talking about shares.
That's why I created my January portfolio update as a video for the first time. Of course I would love to hear your feedback!
Target 2025
Building a house makes it particularly difficult to formulate a goal this year.
A certain savings rate? Difficult if additional costs are suddenly added
A certain deposit value? Also difficult, as I can't really back this up with my savings rate this year.
Nevertheless, I would formulate the following goal for this year:
Current portfolio balance is €300,000. I would estimate additional investments at ~€15,000. With an average market return of ~7%, that would be price gains of ~€21,000.
This would put my portfolio at €330,000 to €340,000 at the end of 2025.
-> I would therefore aim for a portfolio value of well over €300,000, so that a 2% fluctuation does not lead directly back below €300k.
Over the past year I have struggled tremendously to find good investment opportunities. I am convinced that at some point the market will experience a crash, so I have been focusing my efforts on building a cash position to take advantage of good opportunities in the future.
Even so, with the turmoil caused by DeepSeek on Monday I had the chance to allocate some capital to $ASML (-2,09%) at a good price ($663). However, aside from these small dips, it has been challenging to find good investment opportunities. So, over the past year I have turned my attention to potential turnarounds.
Last July, I made my first bet on the recovery of $SBUX (-6,28%) which is already paying off with an appreciation of over 40%. A large part of this growth is due to the hiring of Brian Niccol, former CEO of Chipotle, on September 9.
However, it was in November that I made my biggest move in a potential turnaround. I closed my position in ADIDAS and started buying $NKE (+3,05%) the blue chip that depreciated the most in 2024. Currently, Nike already accounts for almost 20% of my portfolio with an average cost of $74.20. I believe that inevitably the company will recover under the leadership of Elliott Hill. Elliot has been a Nike employee since the 1980s so he knows the path to take to get the brand back on track.
What about you? Do you have any turnaround moves in your portfolio? Are there any struggling companies you believe will make a strong comeback?
🔹 Revenue: $9.4B (Est. $9.42B) 🟡; Flat YoY
🔹 EPS: $0.69 (Est. $0.67)🟢 ; DOWN -23% YoY
🔹 Operating Margin: 11.9% (Contracted 390 bps YoY)
🔹 Global Comparable Store Sales: DOWN -4% YoY (Est. -4.06%)
Segment Highlights:
North America Segment
🔹 Revenue: $7.07B; DOWN -1% YoY
🔹 Comparable Store Sales: DOWN -4% YoY
🔹 Transactions: DOWN -8% YoY
🔹 Ticket Size: UP +4% YoY
🔹 Operating Income: $1.18B; DOWN -22% YoY
🔹 Operating Margin: 16.7% (Contracted 470 bps YoY)
International Segment
🔹 Revenue: $1.87B; UP +1% YoY
🔹 Comparable Store Sales: DOWN -4% YoY
🔹 Transactions: DOWN -2% YoY
🔹 Ticket Size: DOWN -2% YoY
🔹 Operating Income: $237M; DOWN -2% YoY
🔹 Operating Margin: 12.7% (Contracted 40 bps YoY)
Channel Development Segment
🔹 Revenue: $436M (Est. $516M); DOWN -3% YoY
🔹 Operating Income: $208M; DOWN -1% YoY
🔹 Operating Margin: 47.7% (Expanded 90 bps YoY)
Operational Metrics:
🔹 North America: DOWN -4% YoY
🔹 International: DOWN -4% YoY
🔹 China Comparable Store Sales: DOWN -6% YoY
🔹 Ticket Size: DOWN -4% YoY
🔹 Transactions: DOWN -2% YoY
🔹 Net New Stores: 377 in Q1, totaling 40,576 stores globally
🔹 U.S. and China Stores: Account for 61% of the portfolio
🔹 Starbucks Rewards Membership: 34.6M active members, UP +1% YoY, UP +2% QoQ
Strategic and Business Updates:
🔸 Announced enhancements to U.S. retail store partners' benefits, including doubling paid parental leave for employees working 20+ hours weekly, effective March 2025.
🔸 Launched the "Back to Starbucks" initiative, focusing on improving customer experiences, operational efficiency, and partner engagement.
🔸 Introduced a new mission statement: “To be the premier purveyor of the finest coffee in the world, inspiring and nurturing the human spirit — one person, one cup, and one neighborhood at a time.”
🔸 Declared a cash dividend of $0.61 per share, payable February 28, 2025, marking 59 consecutive quarters of dividends.
One of my first individual shares leaves my portfolio.
$SBUX (-6,28%) I bought about 7 years ago.
Bring a little coffee (material input in the cent range) to the market at top prices and people are queuing up.
The money man likes that.
But Starbucks has lost its luster in recent years.
The easiest way to save on coffee is to make everything more expensive.
China expansion as a growth driver is turning out to be a pipe burst.
So actually a turnaround investment by now. But the valuation is far too high for that.
The new CEO must first get the problems under control. I'm not taking my chances and am selling with a nice 100% gain.
... Although the fees are ridiculously high from today's perspective. What can happen in 7 years...
The year 2024 is over in stock market terms and I would also like to review the year.
I started with a portfolio value of just over €53,000.
I knew that a reallocation of around €20,000 was still to come and had therefore set my sights on the target of €100,000.
This was very ambitious, as I naturally didn't know what the year would bring. After all, there were already enough economic and political uncertainties at the start of 2024.
As I only really started investing in 2021 and 2022 was therefore my first full year on the stock market, I made a lot of mistakes at the beginning, had fluctuations in my strategy (once one was in place) and of course also made a few losses.
That's why it was important for me to stay true to my strategy in 2024 and not throw everything overboard again. Because, as I always say, going back and forth empties your pockets.
Some of you may also remember my early days, when I had a lot of savings plans in place, but they weren't particularly high and were constantly being changed. At the beginning of 2024, my portfolio contained a total of 47 individual share positions and 3 ETFs.
My goals for 2024 were therefore
2024 went as follows for me:
January: +4.0%
February: +1.3%
March: +3.0%
April: -0.4%
May: +0.5%
June: +1.7%
July: +1.7%
August: +0.9%
September: +1.0%
October: -0.4%
November: +3.4%
December: -1.7%
TTWROR 2024: +15.8%
Dividend (already in the performance): € 1956.56
Invested: €24,900
Reallocation: €21,700
Thanks to a special payment from my old employer, to which I was still entitled, I was surprisingly able to invest around €5,000 more than I had originally thought.
Did I achieve my goals?
Not all of them.
With the dividends, I'm ~€43 below my target. That's a shame, but it motivates me to step on the gas even more and crack the €2400 net dividend in 2025. That would be €200 net per month, which corresponds to an increase of 22.66%. Again, very ambitious, but you should set yourself ambitious goals.
However, I was already able to break the €100,000 barrier in September. This was of course due to the strong market. I ended the year with just over €111,500. I have remained true to my strategy, but a few new stocks have slipped into the portfolio (and a few out).
The cheering contribution to the €100,000 was here:
https://app.getquin.com/de/activity/XGtdQzCdYF
New in the depot:
$NESN (-3,88%) Nestle
$CTAS (-6,69%) Cintas (savings plan)
$RACE (-3,06%) Ferrari
$D05 (-5,73%) DBS
$UNH (-2%) United Health
$V (-6,9%) visas
$CSNDX (-5,5%) Nasdaq 100 (savings plan)
$XEON (-0%) As an overnight money substitute for fixed planned money for loan repayment in 6 years or special repayment if the interest rate on the balance falls below the loan interest rate of 0.75%. Is topped up with special payments from the employer during this period.
Left my securities account:
$AAL (-10,34%) Anglo American PLC (+37%)
$IBM (-5,4%) (+26%)
$BAC (-7,71%) Bank of America (+45%)
$UKW (-3,14%) Greencoat UK Wind (0 to 0 due to dividends)
$SBUX (-6,28%) Starbucks (+10%)
$BIGG (-6,57%) Bigg Digital Group (-95%)
Unfortunately, I sold IBM and Bank of America too early, but I am still satisfied.
What else has happened?
Outlook for 2025
So what are my plans for 2025 in terms of finances?
What are your targets for 2025? Did you reach your 2024 targets and to what extent did you change your targets after reaching (or not reaching) your 2024 targets?
Feel free to let me know in the comments, as I always find it very exciting to see how ambitiously others set/change their goals.
I wish you a good start to 2025 and every success with all your plans and goals.
As with everything, of course, if you're not interested, feel free to keep scrolling and/or use the block function. 😊
In Part 1 I described my start as an investor from 2010 to 2016. Despite loss-making investments and bad decisions (buying AT&T instead of Amazon), I was able to achieve a portfolio value of €35,000. These experiences were to lay the first foundation stone for my future successful investment strategy (https://app.getquin.com/de/activity/PElWrODsmV)
In part 2 I talk about further setbacks in 2017 and 2018 and how the purchase of MasterCard shares marked the turning point in my investment career. Despite initial losses and professional dissatisfaction, I realized that my original strategy wasn't working and discovered the "dividend growth" for me. With a new professional position and a solid salary, I was finally able to really hit the ground running in 2019 (https://app.getquin.com/de/activity/LUkWiLtZKX)
In part 3 it will now be about the years 2019 to 2021 will be discussed. In these 3 years, my portfolio has increased fivefold. From €40,000, it went up to €199,000 in the meantime. But not everything was positive here either. During this time, I also made the two worst trades of my investment career. In addition to Wirecard, there were two other equity investments that resulted in losses of over 80%.
The year 2019 & the first share savings plans:
The year 2019 started with a portfolio balance of ~€40,000 and after my MasterCard purchase in December 2018, my major portfolio reorganization was to continue directly at the beginning of 2019. So in the first four months with Tencent $700 (-6,2%)
Intel $INTC (-10,9%)
Salesforce $CRM (-5,08%)
Alphabet $GOOG (-2,49%) and Meta $META (-4,44%) (then still Facebook), five more tech stocks were added to my portfolio. In return I have BHP Billiton $BHP (-7,33%)
Macy's $M (+0,68%)
and Hugo Boss $BOSS (-2,48%) sold.
Later in the year, the shares of Mercedes $MBG (-5,9%)
and AT&T $T (-6,7%) were also removed from the portfolio.
In addition to further acquisitions such as Pepsi $PEP (-1,81%)
Nextera Energy $NEE (-5,91%)
or Xylem $XYL (-4,99%) I also recognized the benefits of share savings plans in 2019 and started to set up a pure "savings plan custody account". At that time, this was still done via comdirect or Consorsbank and each savings plan execution cost a fee of 0.75%.
Another sale in 2019 was the Gamestop-share $GME (+7,09%) . Bought in 2016 to have something to do with gaming in the portfolio, but not taking into account that stationary sales are becoming less and less relevant. In the end, the share price fell by 85% - unfortunately, this was long before the memestock hype emerged.
My portfolio rose to ~€67,000 in 2019 and achieved a return of 23%. However, this was still well below the MSCI World and the S&P 500.
The year 2020 - Corona, Wirecard bankruptcy & 100k before 30 in the portfolio
2020 - a year that few of us will probably forget. While everything was still going reasonably smoothly in January and February 2020, chaos was set to break out from mid-February/March.
The first few weeks of 2020 had given rise to hopes of a very positive development in my portfolio. From the beginning of January to mid-February, my portfolio rose by almost €10,000 to €77,000.
Panic then slowly set in from mid-February. I still remember exactly how trading on the US stock markets was repeatedly suspended for short periods and daily losses of 10% were normal. At 0 o'clock sharp, I looked at the US futures and in seconds the futures went down by -5%. A cap for the futures, the futures loss must not be higher and you knew the next morning it would end badly for the DAX.
But when there is blood in the streets, you can make very good deals! So in March 2020 I bought the Allianz
$ALV (-8,43%) for €118. This gives me a personal dividend yield of almost 12% based on the current dividend of €13.80. Unfortunately, I only bought for €1,000 in total.
Also Starbucks
$SBUX (-6,28%) I was able to buy for less than €50.
The stock market crash continued until the Fed made short work of it and ended the crash single-handedly. The crash was ended with interest rate cuts and massive money printing and once again the saying "Never bet against the FED" proved to be true.
The stock markets then went through the roof and within a very short space of time were already back to a positive level compared to the end of 2019. Every share that somehow falls under the term "stay at home" was suddenly the hot tip on the stock market. Whether the Peloton $PTON (-4,7%)
or Teladoc $TDOC (-2,35%) everything went through the roof.
I let myself get carried away and did about 10 "Stay at Home" hype stocks into a growth savings plan portfolio. Of these, at the end of 2024 with Sea $SE (-10,71%) and MercadoLibre $MELI (-4,71%) only two shares remained. It goes without saying that most of them left the portfolio at a loss.
But 2020 was also the Wirecard year $WDI BaFin's ban on short selling, a year-long audit by EY, political backing and massive investments by German fund managers from DWS, UnionInvest and Deka vs. a journalist from the Financial Times.
Wirecard's claims that the journalist was in cahoots with short sellers and the backing from various institutions were unfortunately too credible for me.
When Wirecard faced the press and announced that EUR 2 billion could no longer be found, things went downhill and it became clear to everyone that the company was heading for insolvency. Before trading was suspended, I was able to sell my shares at a 50% loss and got off lightly.
Later in the year, I was able to conclude an extremely favorable leasing offer and sell my private car. The proceeds went straight into my securities account and I broke the €100,000 barrier in November 2020.
My portfolio then ended the year with a value of ~€120,000. At +5%, my performance was pretty much in line with the MSCI World.
The year 2021 - HYPE! Wall Street bets, crypto and almost 200k in the portfolio
The year 2021 was characterized above all by hypes. Cryptocurrencies, memestocks and memecoins were in the headlines everywhere. Gamestop, Dogecoin, SPACs and NFTs everyone had to have.
Traditional shares became almost boring.
One of the reasons was certainly the checks that the US government issued to its citizens. It was still Corona, many were locked down and suddenly people started gambling on the stock market.
The hype can be illustrated very well using the example of NFTs. In 2021, NFTs worth $17 billion were traded, in 2023 it was only 80 million - a decline of 97%. According to one study, ~95% of all NFTs are now completely worthless.
The madness in one example: Procter & Gamble launched a Charmin toilet paper NFT. This was sold for over $4,000. All proceeds were donated, but a symbol of the madness of 2021.
From a portfolio perspective, 2021 was great! In the end, there was a +32% return and a portfolio value of over €190,000, which at times in November 2021 was €199,000.
My top performers were NVIDIA
$NVDA (-7,25%) with over 100% price gains and Pfizer $PFE (-4,59%)
, which was driven by the vaccine hype and at €50 was twice as high as in 2024.
My worst performer was another 80% loss with TAL Education $TAL (-8,16%) . An education company from China. Unfortunately, this was the first time I was able to experience the political arbitrariness in countries like China. Overnight, it was decided that education/tutoring could only be run as a non-profit. Of course, this was almost a death sentence for the company and the share price plummeted by 80%.
Asset development & return:
After the years 2013 to 2018 were forgettable in terms of returns, the years 2019 to 2021 finally delivered:
Year
Deposit value
Yield
2019 67.000€ +19%
2020 121.000€ +5%
2021 193.000€ +34%
Vermögensentwicklung 2019-2021:
Vermögensentwicklung 2013-2021:
Outlook:
Looking back on the hype year 2021, it is almost obvious that 2022 had to be clearly negative.
After the party, however, came the hangover in the form of inflation and the war in Ukraine. Sharply rising interest rates and global economic concerns did the rest.
In the next part, I would therefore like to look at the years 2022 & 2023. I will then combine 2024 with my review of the year in the last part.
