November 2020 Update – Investment Returns

Hello Everyone! Welcome to my November update where I will discuss my returns for October 2020. Last month has been crazy with the lead up to the election, the amount of volatility in the share market, and of course, all of the new corona virus cases. I do have some exciting news – this month I have started tracking and showing my American share portfolio! We will get to that soon. For now, here are all of my results:

• my American share portfolio has begun You can see the full details and chart further down. The portfolio has only started, and has returned returned -2.18% against the SPDR S&P 500 ETF which returned -5.01%
• my P2P and Crowdlending investment profile returned an average of 0.68%, bringing my total for crowdlending to a return of 7.92% so far this year. My highest returns came from Reinvest24 (5.33%), Bondora (0.99%), and Mintos (0.74%)
• my Solar panel system generate 90 kWh of energy (paid out in BTC) this month, bringing my total to 407 kWh.
• my total investment value increased by 5.5% from last month.

Quick Summary

The main items that happened throughout November include:

• Tracking of my American share portfolio
• I read and enjoyed: The Single Best Investment – Creating Wealth with Dividend Growth
• New articles:
  • My Journey to One Free Bitcoin
  • How to Buy Bitcoin – Fast, Secure and Cheap
  • 5 Steps to Getting Started with Cryptocurrency
• A guest post by Linda Richardson – How I Jump-Started my Retirement Plan in Just 30 Minutes

Overall Asset Allocation

Here I provide a “big picture” of my asset diversification. I also drill down into the differences within my crowdlending portfolio

This month I used some of my free cash to purchase more shares. Crowdlending is just over 10%. Within crowdlending, I have more than half of my investments in Crowdestor. This month I have started to include an “other section” which comprises things such as unlisted shares, litigation funding platforms, and the sun exchange.

Progress Towards Financial Freedom

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The above graph is not related to net wealth, but instead my progress towards a set amount of total investments

I remain over my guideline! This month I had a net gain (again) of >5%. This was due to some more cash being allocated to the portfolio.

I have been on the financial freedom path for a while, however, I have not documented my progress until now. Instead of using actual values, I am using percentages (with the goal being 100%). I have an initial conservative plan of 20 years and have provided a guide as to my current progress. You can also see my longer-term graph (i.e. the next 20 years) back on my main returns page.

Share Portfolio

This month will be the first month where I track my dividend investment portfolio. As can be seen below, over this very short time, I have already been able to slightly outperform the SPDR S&P 500 ETF. Obviously this is early early days, however, my goal is to be able to match the fund, while also being able to generate passive income through dividends.

Now, my portfolio is not solely based on dividend companies. I do have other growth stocks that don’t pay dividends, however these are in other currencies and exchanges, and not a part of this account shown here.

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If you are interested to see the breakdown of the investments, please see the chart below. This month I added to all of the positions at various times throughout October. I have a list of additional companies that I am interested in purchasing soon, however I am just waiting for a cheaper entry point.

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I will soon fill in the reasoning behind my purchases above, but the main overall drive for each of the companies are favorable prices, higher than average dividends, and most have a high rate of dividend growth. A lot of these purchases are also products of my readings – The Single Best Investment – Creating Wealth with Dividend Growth and Get Rich with Dividends: A Proven System for Earning Double-Digit Returns. I encourage you to have a look at both of these books (they are both free in pdf version) as they really outline a path to wealth (and a sleep easy portfolio) through dividend paying companies.

Additional to the above, I have two other accounts that are not shown (as they don’t generate passive income each month) – A “set and forget” account that invests a set amount each month into various index funds, and various accounts in other currencies and exchanges.

P2P and Crowdlending

My Returns in Crowdlending this month

This month saw my P2P and Crowdlending profile return on average 0.68%, which is farily standard if you have been watching my retunrs over the last 6 months. This is why only 10% of my portfolio is in Crowdlending, and why I am not focusing any more money into this passive income source at this time. However. this month the EU parliament has released new rules for crowdfunding, as part of the Fintech Action Plan proposed by the European Commission.

The new Regulations will provide a single set of rules for all European Crowdfunding Service Providers (ECSP) across Europe. The new regulation will enter force on 10 November 2021. You can read a further rundown on the rules from the European Crowdfunding Network here.

As can be seen below, by far the best performer in my crowdlending portfolio so far in 2020, has been Reinvest24. This is followed by the consistent returns from Bondora, and then the lumpy returns from Crowdestor.

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Quick P2P News

Here is a quick one-liner on some interesting things that were happening around in the P2P space in October:

• Mintos has announced that they are seeking crowdfunding, whereby current investors can own part of the platform.
• Reinvest24 returned an average of 14.24% from their Majaka projects.
• Crowdestor Secondary Market has had a lot of great deals.
• LendingClub closing down their platform for retail investors.

Crowdlending Summary

	Returns this month	Returns Since Inception	Time Invested
Mintos	0.74%	33%	>3 years
Bondora	0.99%	42%	>2 years
Grupeer	–	24%	>2 years
RateSetter (AU) (now Plenti)	0.59%	43%	>5 years
Fast Invest	0.04%	20%	>1.75 years
Crowdestor	0.70%	19%	>1.755 years
Reinvest24	5.33%	16%	>1 year

As with last month, and continuing into the next few months I have decided to discuss each platform first then share the graphs of my past returns. There isn’t so much to say this month. A lot of the platforms are struggling with defaults due to the corona virus early in the year. Unfortunately with the virus coming back in Europe at the moment, it doesn’t look like there we will see full funding being returned any time soon.

Mintos – There were no updates to my portfolio this month. This month Mintos announced that they are seeking funding from investors that are interested in owning part of the platform. The main reason that they are seeking funds is to accelerate our growth and develop new products. You can read more about the crowdfunding campaign here.

Reinvest24 – This month Tanel and the team were able to sell the last of their Majaka properties with an average of 14.24% annual income. This has fast become my favorite platform for

One of the best things is that the team will make videos showing you the progress of your investments, and the underlying projects. Additionally you can generate a great profit as well!

This was the final video for the Majuka projects (6 apartments total), of which I invested in two.

Bondora, Plenti, Fast Invest – Nothing to say about these platforms this month. Bondora and Plenti performed consistently, and Fast Invest only had an interest payment on one loan.

Crowdestor – Unfortunately, due to the COVID, a lot of the projects on Crowdestor are becoming delayed in payment. However, there are still some projects that are not delayed, and some projects that have now been fully repaid. This month I was able to make use of the Secondary Market, where I picked up multiple loans for Mafia Stars, and Elvi Groceries at discounts of over 10%. This means that if the loans pay out (which is likely as they are all current without missing any payments), I am looking at between 30% and 40% returns on my investments. Another persons fear has likely turned into my profit.

Grupeer – No sign of any payments of funds being received. The most recent article says that in the next few weeks Grupeer will resume full operation as a company and legal entity. I guess we just have to wait and see.

Speaking of platforms that are (or were) in trouble, I thought I may take a trip down memory lane. As you may remember, in February, I decided to get out of a 3 platforms (Wisefund, Crowd Estate and Monethera) after the problems with Kuetzal and Envestio.
I wanted to provide a quick update about each of these platforms.

Crowd Estate – If you remember, I did initially invest in the platform, putting money into 6 loans. Out of those 6 loans, 4 had problems, and I was unable to sell out of those. When I look into my account today, and…..

• One of the loans been declared bankrupt with the assets of the company being sold off. (Total return a 75% loss).
• One is currently in the bankruptcy process, with hearing set to a time soon. This has secured debt, as the collateral, however I doubt that I will be getting any substantial money back.
• The other 2 projects (or companies) have had to file multiple reorganization plans as they are unable to pay their interest.

This just reminds me that Crowd Estate is not a platform that I will ever invest in again. I prefer platforms that are actually in control of their projects – such as Reinvest24.

Wisefund

The only one project that I had invested in Wisefund, was defaulted at the end of September. It is now in the hands of a debt collection company

Monethera

Not one month after I pulled out of Monethera (February), they provided the following tweet to all their investors –

Sorry to tweet this, but we are forced to suspend all activities due to the coronavirus crisis. We want to explain all the details, so there is a newsletter on your emails. We don’t tell you goodbye and hope to see you after the pandemic. pic.twitter.com/HnxFbygo1e

— Monethera (@monethera) March 27, 2020

Well it seems like we wont be seeing Monethera again any time soon as their website is now gone and the company was declared bankrupt earlier in the year.

Just another reason why doing some due dilligence is always important.

Mintos

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Bondora

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Grupeer

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Plenti (previously RateSetter)

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Fast Invest

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Crowdestor

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Reinvest24

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The Sun Exchange

A few months ago, I purchased some solar cells from The Sun Exchange (if you use the affiliate link, then you will get 1 free solar cell on your first purchase!). The Sun Exchange is the world’s first peer-to-peer solar cell micro-leasing platform.

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The platform works by people purchasing solar cells, which are then leased to companies (such as schools, nursing homes, shopping malls etc), who will pay for the electricity that is generated by your cells. The companies generally can’t afford the outright cost of the systems themselves, which is where the crowdfunding aspect comes in. The solar system will be split up into many smaller cells, that are sold at a reasonable price. Solar cells can be bought in either BTC or the local currency (ZAR). I will write a more detailed article about the platform in the future, so look out for that!

This month my cells were able to generate 90 kWh of energy (paid out in BTC), and I was able to purchase solar cells in a retirement village, and an elderly care home:

• ECHO Foundation – Munro Kirk | 145.20 kW | Port Elizabeth, South Africa (IRR 11.59%)
• CPOA Kronendal Retirement Village | 165.40 kW | Cape Town, South Africa (IRR 11.73%)

Unfortunately these projects have closed, but there is an project with cells available for SPAR Plaza (IRR 11.61%). This would be the fifth SPAR supermarket to go solar through The Sun Exchange.

My total energy generated through The Sun Exchange is currently at 407 kWh, which would allow me to drive 1,512 American miles in a Tesla Model 3 (just need to buy one first).

For some comparison, with 1 kWh you can, toast 160 slices of bread. So in that regard, I have generated enough power to toast 65,120 slices of bread.

AxiaFunder

Recently I invested in litigation funding through AxiaFunder. This is external to other platforms, as the income is not controlled by borrowers ability to pay a loan on time, the currency exchange rate, the markets, or other global health pandemics. AxiaFunder connects investors with carefully pre-vetted commercial litigation opportunities. The platform invests in legal cases where there is a high probability of winning at court, with potential returns of 20%-30% pa. The only downside with litigation funding – returns are not guaranteed, there is a risk of loosing all of the investment if the case fails, and in some very extreme circumstances, could have to pay more than the amount you put in. (every case is insured, but if the insurance company was to default, then the investors would need to fund more of the project).

Journey to 1 free Bitcoin

My journey is still an ongoing work in progress. Playing games, making Coin. This month I was able to put all of my updates and platforms into a single article, so I don’t have to reference each section every month! You can find the main article here – My Journey to One Free Bitcoin

Coinbase Earn

This month I found that there is a course to learn about Algorand (ALGO) through Coinbase Earn. “Algorand is a blockchain platform that aims to be scalable, secure, and decentralized. Learn how it works and you’ll earn up to $6 in ALGO.”

Here is how it works
You watch some short videos through Coinbase, on how various cryptocurrencies work. From this, I have earned some Ethereum (ETH), Stellar Lumens (XLM), EOS (EOS), Basic Attention Tokens (BAT), and Dai (DAI). I wrote an in-depth article that you can find here.

Brave Browser

I have been using the Brave Browser for the last couple of months. Find out here why I changed to a more secure and rewarding browser. Basically, you get paid to watch advertisements (if you choose to). It allows users to earn a bit of cryptocurrency and allows advertisers to promote materials to a more select crowd. Since I have installed the browser, I have blocked 656,181 trackers and ads, and saved 9.1 hours of loading time.

Money Savings 

With so much work, and not a lot of time to be on Twitter, but here are some of my recent tweets:

Listening to the 1994 Berkshire annual meeting while deep into a excel spreadsheet about challengers, contenders and champions dividend.

????♥️

— Matt | thewahman (@MattWAHman) October 15, 2020

Love working at home in my PJs!

Just trying to create a comfortable and stress free work space ????

— Matt | thewahman (@MattWAHman) October 7, 2020

Progress on Internal Changes

In a past update, I made a pledge to update sections of my blog. I will keep this section here until these tasks are fully complete. The remaining tasks are:

• (Priority #1) Adding a page outlining some basic steps for how due diligence can be performed. (started writing this)
• (Priority #2) Adding a section to each platform review with my own due diligence.
• (Priority #3) Placing stronger disclaimers within each platform review page saying how my interests lie within the article.
  (Note: currently, there are already disclaimers on all of the pages, however, I will look to have them as more of a focus) .

Socials and Traffic

Things seem to have remained steady this month

• My twitter followers remain steady
• My website sessions decreased 3% ;(

You read it all the way through to the end (or you just skipped half of it)! Regardless, thanks for checking out my update this month!
I do encourage you to comment below, and sign up for my newsletter. The newsletter comes out once a month and includes this update and any other articles published during the month.