I sold one of my two defense ETFs today. I had been toying with the idea for a few days and wanted to switch the amount into my small-cap ETF $WSML (+0,34%) into my small-cap ETF. For me it was a small sector bet and I'm happy with the realized profit. In retrospect, I should have exited earlier, but that's always the case...

Hey, I have a question for you: what do you think of my portfolio changes?

I've been on the stock market since January and initially invested in three ETFs ($EIMI (+0,32%) , $IWDA (+0,81%) ,$WSML (+0,34%) ) these positions are now gone. Instead, dividend payers have now been added to the portfolio. Was this a sensible decision (in my opinion there is no right opinion on this subject)?

Some of you may have noticed:

I was hardly active on getquin for a long time. There was no particular external reason for this; it was more of a conscious step back.

At that time, my portfolio was completely high risk oriented. Lots of bets, lots of hope, lots of emotion. In the meantime, I was also really clearly in the red 📉. Those weren't nice phases and, to be honest, I was more mentally preoccupied than I wanted to admit.

So I withdrew.

Not out of frustration, but to reflect.

✅ Less noise, more conviction

For several weeks, months in fact, I thought hard about my strategy:

• Which risk really suits me?
• Which companies do I believe in for the long term, even if things don't go well for a while?
• How do I create a portfolio that not only has return potential, but also brings mental calm?

The consequence of this:

Today, my portfolio is more clearly structured, broader-based and significantly less risky. Without completely foregoing opportunities.

Yes, Rocket Lab ($RKLB (+6,95%) ) and Iris Energy ($IREN (+7,5%) ) are still high-risk investments 🚀. I am fully aware of that.

The difference to before:

I no longer hold them out of greed, but out of genuine conviction in the companies and their future.

ETFs as a foundation

However, the most important change came with the foundation of my portfolio: ETFs.

I deliberately opted for a consistent savings plan to bring me long-term stability and growth:

• iShares Core MSCI World ($IWDA (+0,81%) ) - 900 € per month
• MSCI World Small Cap ($WSML (+0,34%) ) - 300 € per month
• Xtrackers MSCI Emerging Markets ($XEMD (+0,28%) ) - € 387.50 per month
• Global X Copper Miners ETF ($COPX (-1,82%) ) - € 412.50 per month

This mix feels just right for me at the moment:

global, diversified, future-oriented and yet calm enough not to get emotionally involved in every market movement.

🛌 Performance is coming - sleep is more important

My portfolio is currently performing very, very well.

Of course I hope it stays that way for the time being, but that's no longer the main point.

The biggest difference compared to before is something else:

👉 I can sleep well again.

No constant checking, no panic on red days, no extreme hoping for the next hype.

Instead: Trust in my structure and my decisions.

Lg

Don

Small milestone

Next Step: 50k

After my wedding, the savings plans will be adjusted again to

600€ $IWDA (+0,81%)

350€ $EIMI (+0,32%)

250€ $WSML (+0,34%)

So... Portfolio completely reorganized ... let's see if the optimization brings something....

• $SC0J (+0,83%)
• $EIMI (+0,32%)
• $EWG2 (+0%)
• $BTC (+3,39%)
• $WSML (+0,34%)
• .......

Hello dear Getquinners,

I started investing in securities at the beginning of the year.

For many years, we parked our assets in call money accounts, which meant that we lost money for years due to high inflation with (negative) compound interest effects. I now want to change this and have therefore decided to invest some of our assets in the capital market.

We are a family with two small children (aged 1 and 4). We parents are in our mid-30s and in the middle of our working lives.

My goals/hopes are:

• long-term investment >10 years and more
• Inflation protection and (real) asset accumulation beyond overnight interest rates
• If necessary, partial transfer of assets to help the children get started when they come of age

As I don't want to gamble, it should be as "simple" as possible to handle and I am not a daredevil, I have created a "boring" ACWI-IMI portfolio.

We have invested around 60%, the rest is free liquidity, which would last for around 12-14 months without income given our current cost of living. A little conservative perhaps, but that's a start. I also don't want to get scared if the markets take a nosedive.

This is how it looks:

75% core:

• 55% MSCI World $IWDA (+0,81%)
• 10% MSCI World Small Cap $WSML (+0,34%)
• 10% MSCI Emerging Markets IMI $EIMI (+0,32%)

8.5% Precious metals

• Physical gold $IGLN (+0,13%)

15% Satellites with approx. 2% each

• $IB1T (+3,1%) Bitcoin share with high opportunity and high risk. Personally, I am not yet completely convinced of this position, I see the "intrinsic" value of a (this) digital currency as being confronted with major environmental problems and am therefore critical. On the other hand, it is supposed to be "digital gold". We will see in the future what is true and what is not...

• $SEMI (+1,3%) and $XDWT (+2,13%) I believe in the AI boom and growing markets in digitalization, and see growth opportunities there, but also risks. Naturally increases the USA share in the portfolio...

• $$DFEN (+1,06%) : Anti-cyclical position in the current increasingly global conflicts. Defense spending is rising worldwide...

• $WMIN (-1,2%) and $RARE (-3,46%) as a commodity mix in basic materials. See this as an opportunity with risk, but perhaps this also reacts anti-cyclically to weak markets

• $GERD (+0,77%) as a personal experiment, as I have read and heard a lot from Gerd Kommer. Can be seen as a core holding, perhaps as a benchmark to the core. I wanted to give it a try.

I also toyed with $WNUC (-2%) but I have to think about whether I really want to invest in nuclear technology (personally subjective thing...). I also read and follow 3XGTAA with interest, but that's too risky for me (for now), for now I'll stay in the World fairway...

Monthly savings installments go equally into the core. I plan to rebalance once a year during the Christmas vacations.

I read a lot in the community and regularly follow the posts. Time and again I also read negative statements about sector and industry bets.

I would be interested to know what you think of my portfolio and why some of you think that sector and sector bets are bad.

Thank you for your feedback and for your consistently excellent contributions to the community!

February was a challenging and volatile month.

A strong start to the year was followed by a significant sector-rotationtriggered by risk-off-flowsa reassessment of growth stocks and the need to consistently address operational weaknesses in the portfolio.

Despite the volatility, it was a month of strategic realignment:

📊 Monthly performance: -3,15%

📊 Portfolio value: ~39.144 €

📊 Performance max: +27,58%

📊 Performance YTD: -1,32%

Performance & comparison 🚀

February was characterized by a clear sector rotation:

Software & high-beta tech corrected under pressure, while selected hardware stocks and broadly diversified value stocks showed relative stability.

Performance in comparison (01.02-28.02.2026):

My portfolio: -3,48%

NASDAQ 100: -4,05%

S&P 500: -1,29%

DAX: +1,03%

FTSE All-World: +0,97%

👉 The relative underperformance is due to the high growth exposure, although the portfolio just managed to outperform the NASDAQ 100, which was under heavy pressure.

Purchases, sales & allocation 💶

The focus in February was clearly on portfolio streamlining and strategic shift:

Acquisitions 💰

Hermes ($RMS (+0,71%)) targeted expansion in the quality segment. TSMC ($2330) tactical entry due to the observed shift on the stock market from software to hardware. Bitcoin ($BTC (+3,39%)) - purchase of € 500 from the Euro Overnight Rate Swap ETF ($XEON (+0,02%)) at € 54,216 to lower the average price to € 63,000.

Sales ❌

Complete separation of Tomra Systems ($TOM (-0,26%)) and Novo Nordisk ($NOVO B (-1,51%)), as the companies have been operationally disappointing in recent quarters and there were no clear signs of a turnaround from management.

👉 The cash ratio is currently being used dynamically for opportunities through targeted acquisitions.

Top movers in February 🟢

Despite the market environment, February was driven by quality stocks and successful rebounds.

The strongest performer was Keyence ($6861 (-1,7%)), which showed massive relative strength with +16.21%. Another strong performer was Ferrari ($RACE (+0,74%)) was also strong with +13.45%, followed by Berkshire Hathaway ($BRK.B (-0,4%)), which acted as a stable anchor with +6.22%.

The iShares MSCI World Small Cap ($WSML (+0,34%)) gained +3.61%, while the iShares MSCI ACWI ($ACWI) formed a solid base with +0.70%. The Xtrackers II EUR Overnight Rate ($XEON (+0,02%)) rounded off the picture with +0.15% and served as a source for the Bitcoin investment.

Flop movers in February 🔴

The weaker side of the portfolio was clearly to be found in the growth and crypto segment.

IREN ($IREN (+7,5%)) corrected by -24.10% after the strong previous month. Also Mercado Libre ($MELI (+3,07%)) also came under significant pressure at -17.33%. CrowdStrike ($CRWD (+3,21%)) -16.94% and Snowflake ($SNOW (-1,23%)) -16.36% suffered from the general shift in sentiment in the software sector.

Also Alibaba ($BABA (-1,61%)) also gave back the gains of the previous month with -16.02%. Nubank ($NU (+1,2%)) rounded off the list of losers with -15.90% due to the poor sentiment among payment providers.

👉 Important: These are primarily valuation and sentiment moves, not fundamental breaks - nevertheless, the lack of operational momentum made it necessary to sell positions.

Conclusion 💡

February was not an easy month, but a necessary for rebalancing:

➡️ Strategic separation of stocks without operational momentum

➡️ Focus shiftFrom software/high growth to hardware (TSMC) and focus on quality (Hermes)

➡️ Volatility deliberately used to lower the average Bitcoin price

The environment remains challenging:

Interest rates, Fed expectations and the rotation into hardware stocks will continue to shape the markets in March. The focus remains on quality, operational excellence and liquidity.

❓ Question for the community

Which stock surprised you the most in February - positively or negatively?

👇 Write it in the comments!

Having recently parted with Shitcoins and terminated my building society savings contract, I opened or increased several positions today. I doubled my exposure to the copper mining ETF, increased the Stoxx 600 slightly and added twice to small caps, as I didn't have them in my portfolio before. Let's see how I balance everything out in the future.

I always like to test promising systematic strategies. On Getquin and especially from @Epi there are a lot of them. Most recently, GTAA and especially the 3x variant with the certificate received a lot of attention (https://getqu.in/2Ya4VP/). As I would like to expand my momentum strategies, I have now also taken a look at GTAA.

1) Starting point

First of all, I wanted to replicate the GTAA strategy of @Epi to replicate it. Mainly because I am interested in daily data and Epi only looked at monthly data in the backtest.

For this I used the following universe (from Epi's GTAA Max):

3xQQQ, BTC, PRIDX, VUSTX

Period from 01.01.2016

How @Epi I use 200SMA and Dual Momentum as a signal and trade once a month:

I get a strong 42% CAGR, 30% Vola, -50% Max Drawdown and end up pretty much with Epi's numbers. It should be noted that my drawdown is calculated daily and not monthly as with Epi.

Now I have categorized the numbers a bit:

• BTC from 2016 is of course subject to survivorship bias. Nobody would have allocated 33% of the portfolio to BTC in 2016.
• I looked at the performance distribution and realized that 60% of the performance was generated by BTC and 37% by TQQQ. So together they generated 97% of the performance and it doesn't matter which assets are still in the universe. I modified the universe and added bonds, for example. The result was the same.
• The weakest day was -25% on 12.03.2020, which is pretty heavy
• If you extend the strategy to the period from 2007 (BTC is added from 2016), you only get 28% with 24% vola and -50% MaxDD
• If you now only use BTC from 2018 onwards, you get 20% CAGR, 23% vola, -50% MaxDD. So not so great anymore. Whereby 64% of the performance is attributable to TQQQ. You might as well invest directly in the QQQQ.

Please have a look at the backtest of @Jesko (https://getqu.in/0ydHY0/). We have also seen drawdowns of -60% and more. @Jesko has rebuilt 3xGTAA better than me (I only used GTAA MAX and did a rather inaccurate test).

2) Target

I would like to add GTAA to my portfolio. But the presented variants of Epi are either too defensive (10-15%CAGR) or too risky (-50% daily drawdown) for me. Epi's 3xGTAA will probably also experience drawdowns of this magnitude. In April it was already 37% (again the reference to @Jesko ).

Therefore, I would like to optimize my GTAA variant for special parameters, which should achieve the following:

• highest possible CAGR
• maximum drawdown as low as possible (small drawdowns are not bad, larger drawdowns should be significant)
• the shortest possible periods of sideways movement. It is a big risk if you think that the strategy is not working because it has been going sideways for years while all indices are at record highs and you therefore abandon the strategy. Epi also mentioned this point. I am happy to accept a few percent long-term performance in return.

I also want to achieve the best possible performance distribution. This allows me to achieve better diversification. If the performance drivers are not so strong, then hopefully there are enough other assets that can at least partially fill the gap.

To do this, it was first necessary to determine the universe. In doing so, I only considered assets that have delivered performance and/or reduced risk.

3) The universe

The following assets are included in my universe:

3xSPY (US equities) $3USL (+2,38%)

3xEEM (developing country equities) $3EML (-1,16%)

EXUS (industrialized countries without US equities) $EXUS (+0,52%)

2xWSML (world small cap equities) $null (+3,42%)

IXC (Utilities) $IXC (+0,87%)

3xTLT (long US bonds) Cash + $TLT5 (+2,18%)

3xIEF (medium US bonds) $3TYL (+1,09%)

XBCU (commodities) $XBCU (-0,79%)

2xGOLD (gold) $LBUL (-0,61%)

BTC (Bitcoin) $BTC (+3,39%)

This achieves the first goal: diversification in the universe.

All regions are covered and, with the small cap ETF, almost the entire investable market. In addition, there are cyclical components such as commodities or utilities, which are highly correlated, but in my tests have synergies that reduce the risk. In addition, gold and BTC + US bonds, as they have provided the best and safest long-term returns.

I would also like to mention that the STOXX50 or oil performed very poorly in my tests and are therefore not in the universe.

In addition, ETFs exist almost everywhere except for the leveraged small caps. There is only one factor certificate that leverages in EUR, i.e. contains the exchange rate twice. My tests reflect this situation. The strategy also works with the unleveraged $WSML (+0,34%) . This leads to 1-2% CAGR less.

4) Parameters to be optimized

Maximize CAGR - 1.1^MaxDD and Minimize 10%MTU. (Explanation follows)

The most important parameter for me is CAGR - 1.1^MaxDD. In other words, the average growth rate minus the drawdown. The drawdown is weighted with an exponential function so that small drawdowns have little influence.

With 20% CAGR and 20% DD, we can accept +1.5% DD for +1% CAGR. At 20% CAGR and 30% DD, only +0.5% DD is acceptable for +1% CAGR. The higher the drawdown, the more excess return we have to achieve in order to accept an even higher drawdown.

The second parameter is 10%MTU. This describes the following situation:

At each point in time, the share price 3, 5 and 7 years ago is considered. The current price is forecast using the CAGR of the entire strategy. The 3 differences between the actual price and the forecast are then added together. The result is the Medium-Term Underperformance (MTU) of this point in time. Example:

The portfolio is at €100 at time x. Three years ago it was at €100, five years ago at €80 and seven years ago at €60. The CAGR of the strategy is 10%.

Now the current value is forecast based on the past:

3 years ago: 100€ with 10% CAGR in 3 years results in 100€*1.1^3 = 133€

5 years ago: 80€ -> results in 129€

7 years ago: 60€ -> results in 117€

But the current price is only €100. The MTU is now the sum of the percentage deviations:

(100-133€)/133€ +(100€-129€)/129€ + (100€-117€)/117€

= -24.8% - 22.5% - 14.5% = -61.8% MTU at time x.

The MTU is therefore a measure of performance over the medium term (3-7 years) and whether the total return was exceeded or underperformed during this period.

10%MTU is obtained by sorting all MTU values and taking the largest value of the lowest decile (10% quantile).

A higher 10%MTU value indicates that the weakest 10% of all mean time periods have performed better than a lower 10%MTU value.

This means that the higher the 10%MTU, the fewer sideways phases there are.

5) Parameters on Epis GTAA Max

(since 2007, with BTC only from 2018)

GTAA MAX:

I will always show 3 graphs. The gray one is the benchmark (S&P 500 TR). I have abstracted Epi's strategy again to get a better comparison to my strategy. It is not traded at the beginning or end of the month, but a simulation for every possible trading day (e.g. the 1st, 15th, 20th, etc.) in the month. The median is shown in blue and the worst case in red. All the above metrics always refer to the worst case in order to calculate as conservatively as possible.

You can already see very few sideways phases, the 10% MTU value is therefore very strong (for the vola) at -35%. Here all metrics (in brackets the benchmark S&P 500 TR):

CAGR 17.36% (10.74%)

Volatility 23.58% (19.5%)

Sharpe Ratio 0.81 (0.6)

Max Drawdown -49.37% (-55.25%)

Worst Day -24.57% (-11.98%)

10%MTU -35.35% (-21.2%)

CAGR - 1.1^MaxDD -91.2 (-180)

The metrics look quite good, but the value for CAGR - 1.1^MaxDD is very low and the worst day is also very weak at 25%. In addition, my diversification target was not met: TQQQ is responsible for 70% of all gains.

6) First tests

First, I tested my universe with the same parameters as Epi.

This looks very similar to GTAA MAX with lower yield and MTU:

CAGR 15.48% (10.74%)

Volatility 25.04% (19.5%)

Sharpe Ratio 0.68 (0.6)

Max Drawdown -51.32% (-55.25%)

Worst Day -22.77% (-11.98%)

10%MTU -45.68% (-21.2%)

CAGR - 1.1^MaxDD -118 (-180)

However, the diversification target has been met. The strongest asset (gold) only accounts for just under 28% of all gains.

7) Optimizations

The result is okay. However, there are still some adjustments to be made. First of all, I checked whether it makes more sense to react to signals less frequently or more often. In times of crisis, you can be invested in a high-risk product for up to a month, even though the momentum has long since reversed. I ran a simulation for this purpose:

As you can clearly see, shorter periods are better. From 3 weeks, the maximum drawdown is considerably lower. But I don't want to trade weekly either, as that would be too much effort. So I will check the signals every 14 days and then trade.

Here you also have to be careful not to fall into a fallacy. The data shown is again the worst case. As higher weekly figures look at more cases, the probability that one of them is bad is also higher. However, the median looks similar, with the exception of 1-2 weeks. These have very similar values and support the thesis that 14 days between trades is sufficient.

Then I remembered that I use the SPY and actually wanted to diversify the Spytips strategy. So why not use the TIPS indicator for the SPY?

So the new rule is:

3xSPY is only considered when TIPS is above its own SMA.

CAGR 19.24% (10.74%)

Volatility 23.30% (19.5%)

Sharpe Ratio 0.86 (0.6)

Max Drawdown -36.59% (-55.25%)

Worst Day -12.59% (-11.98%)

10%MTU -43.39% (-21.2%)

CAGR - 1.1^MaxDD -13.5 (-180)

More return with less vola and lower drawdown. The weakest day is also much better. The 10%MTU is also better.

Next, I would like to hold a maximum of 4 (instead of 3) assets at the same time to further reduce the risk profile.

I do this a little differently than EPI: If there are no 4 assets to hold, only 1,2 or 3 will be held with 100, 50-50 or 33-33-33 weighting respectively. Maximum weightings per asset have been set so that the weighting is not too high:

e.g. 3xTLT, 3xIEF, BTC, IXC, Commodities may only account for a maximum of 30% each and 3xEEM only 20% (effectively reducing the leverage from 3x to 2-2.4. Unfortunately, there is no 2x EM). The rest is filled with cash. This means that in market phases in which few assets are running, these can be weighted higher (30-40%):

CAGR 19.20% (10.74%)

Volatility 24.42% (19.5%)

Sharpe Ratio 0.82 (0.6)

Max Drawdown -29.04% (-55.25%)

Worst Day -12.06% (-11.98%)

10%MTU -44.70% (-21.2%)

CAGR - 1.1^MaxDD 3.3 (-180)

Drawdown is significantly better, but performance remains the same. Here you can also see that the median case performed even better than the last test (blue graph)

Finally, I optimized the SMA values. It should be mentioned that this test is overfitted and should only give an insight into what is possible.

CAGR 24.04% (10.74%)

Volatility 24.33% (19.5%)

Sharpe Ratio 0.98 (0.6)

Max Drawdown -28.79% (-55.25%)

Worst Day -12.06% (-11.98%)

10%MTU -38.81% (-21.2%)

CAGR - 1.1^MaxDD 8.5 (-180)

The best asset (3xSPY) only accounts for 20% of the total return. 10%MTU is over -40%.

Again the performance contribution of all assets:

20% 3xSPY

19% 2xGOLD

13.5% BTC

12.5% 3xEEM

11% 3xTLT

11% 2xWSML

5.5% 3xIEF

5.5% EXUS

2% XBCU

0% IXC

Although XBCU and IXC (commodities and utilities) do not generate a return, they reduce the risk in the portfolio.

8) Classification of the figures

Once again, I would like to list arguments for and against the strategy that result from my methodology:

For:

• worst trading interval considered
• BTC from 2018 is unfortunate. It would look much better from 2019 onwards
• Broad diversification (entire equity universe covered, bonds only US, as bonds from other regions have little momentum, BTC, gold and utilities as commodity/energy exposure)
• 4 assets instead of 3 reduces risk
• TIPS indicator tested several times is used and again sees a significant improvement
• The 3x leverage is "hedged" elsewhere: For EEM the max weight is reduced to 20%, which always results in at least 5% cash and 3xSPY is paired with the TIPS indicator. The 3x on bonds is less risky as bonds are less volatile.
• Survived all crises since 2000

Against:

• SMA optimization is safely overfitted
• There is always a risk of a rapid crash, which can have a major impact on leveraged products.

9) Conclusion

Even if the last test is overfitted, the following metrics result from the backtest:

CAGR: approx. 20%

MaxDD: 30-35%

This means that the GTAA variant, which I called MATT (Multi-Asset Trend Targeting), is a lower-risk alternative to 3xGTAA (a kind of 2-2.5xGTAA).

I am very curious to hear your ideas and suggestions.

10) Wikifolio

Yes, I have also created a wikifolio so that I and others can later invest in this strategy in a tax-efficient manner.

Unfortunately, I was not quite at the end of my development when I set it up, which is why gold is included with 3x leverage and the universe was still significantly smaller. I will change this at the next rebalancing. In fact, it would have performed better as a result.

You can already see the strong correlation with 3xGTAA, although it contains less vola. I'm looking forward to the future, because past performance is no indicator of future performance.

Here is the link to the wikifolio if you are interested:

https://www.wikifolio.com/de/de/w/wf000matt0

11) Further

I have tested the final strategy again from 2000:

CAGR 22.17% (8.11%)

Volatility 22.56% (19.00%)

Sharpe Ratio 0.97 (0.49)

Max Drawdown -29.27% (-55.25%)

Worst Day -12.06% (-11.98%)

10%MTU -33.64% (-29.85%)

While the benchmark yields less, MATT does quite well and loses only 10% instead of 25% CAGR. 10%MTU looks even better.

In general, the development can be divided into the following phases (with the respective performance drivers):

2000 - 2003

CAGR: 0% (-10%)

+ Gold, TLT

- EXUS

2003-2011

CAGR: 33.35% (5.2%)

+ EEM, gold, WSML

- nothing

2010-2020

CAGR: 13.8% (13.98%)

+ SPY, TLT, IEF

- IXC, BTC

2020-2026

CAGR: 38% (15%)

+ SPY, Gold, BTC

- nothing

Hello everyone,

What do you think of this portfolio?

Are there any improvements? Do you have any suggestions?

Thank you

$VWRL (+0,66%)

$WSML (+0,34%)

$SAP (+1,9%)

$NOVO B (-1,51%)

$V (+0,55%)
$DDOG (-0,17%)