Author: Claude

Posted on

Portfolio update – June 2022

Dear fellow investors, friends, family and future self.

Welcome to my second portfolio update or the year 2022, I hope you enjoy them. I’ve decided to post updates at the end of the quarter, as things are not so interesting every single month. Now let’s get into things!

On the professional side, things are not looking good. I’ve got a small raise, but my company had to lay off 10% of its workforce, in an effort to “focus on being profitable”, rather that following growth with all costs. Fortunately I was not affected, but some projects got shut down, including one that I worked a lot in April and May. Oh well, we’ll see what future holds for me.

Continue reading “Portfolio update – June 2022”

Posted on

Portfolio update – March 2022

Dear fellow investors, friends, family and future self.

Happy New Year 2022! Welcome to my first portfolio update or the year 2022, I hope you enjoy them. I’ve decided to post updates at the end of the quarter, as things are not so interesting every single month. Now let’s get into things!

On the professional side, everything is good. I’m settling in the position, getting to know the colleagues and IT systems. I am happy that I work for a global company, with distributed workforce, with no need to come to the office, only when it’s needed. In January I have received my RSUs (reserved stock units), but they will start to get vested starting January 2023, but also this is the time when I will need to pay taxes for them. I will write a separate article about how the RSUs work in my company and how the taxation works in Germany.

Continue reading “Portfolio update – March 2022”

Posted on

Portfolio update – December 2021

Dear fellow investors, friends, family and future self.

Welcome to my seventh portfolio update or the year 2021, I hope you enjoy them. I’ve decided to post updates at the end of the quarter, as things are not so interesting every single month. Now let’s get into things!

October was my last month in the old job, so I’ve decided to use all my remaining vacation days and have a holiday in Alicante, before starting the new job. As I told you in the previous update, we had a semi-failed attempt for a seaside vacation at the Baltic Sea in the middle of July (!!) and we had to try one more time.

Continue reading “Portfolio update – December 2021”

Posted on

Portfolio update – September 2021

Dear fellow investors, friends, family and future self.

Welcome to my sixth portfolio update or the year 2021, I hope you enjoy them. I’ve decided to post updates at the end of the quarter, as things are not so interesting every single month. Now let’s get into things!

The last three months have been exhausting: after the move, which was quite in a rush, we had to arrange the old rental house for the next tenant (this is the unwritten rule in Germany, you get a newly painted and clean house, you need to leave it the same, otherwise the landlord will paint and fix damages out of your deposit). After we managed close the rental contract, we had work to do in our new house: small fixes, work in the garden, buying different furniture and appliances etc. And then it came the renovation of our attic, for the home-office. I think I’ve spent most of my free time in stores like IKEA, Höffner or Bauhaus.

Continue reading “Portfolio update – September 2021”

Posted on

Portfolio update – June 2021

Dear fellow investors, friends, family and future self.

Welcome to my fifth portfolio update or the year 2021, I hope you enjoy them. I’ve decided to post updates at the end of the quarter, as things are not so interesting every single month. Now let’s get into things!

The big news since April is that we finally signed the papers for the house at the notary in May! Horray! Finally, after almost one year of waiting, since the house was reserved for us. Things started to move quickly and at the end of May we received the keys, although the process is not yet finalized and the seller didn’t get the money from us. It is a weird situation for us, because usually the buyer gets the keys and can move in after the seller receives the money in their account. Anyhow, we asked our lawyer and we cancelled our rental contract (thus saving some money), we made some small renovations and end of June we moved to our new home. Our own house in Germany!

Continue reading “Portfolio update – June 2021”

Posted on

Portfolio update – April 2021

Dear fellow investors, friends, family and future self.

Welcome to my fourth portfolio update or the year 2021, I hope you enjoy them. Now let’s get into things!

April was a normal month, but the big news is that things started to move regarding the house we want to buy (actually they started in March). Now we exchanged some documents, we hired a lawyer to help us with the contract and in May we will go to the notary and sign the buying offer. The process for this house is a bit different than for the normal buying process in Germany, because we buy from a big company and they have their internal ways. I will write a separate post about buying a house in Germany.

Investments wise, two of the companies stocks that I’ve bought last month have not performed very well, but I can say that I didn’t make too much investigation into the companies – rookie mistake.

Continue reading “Portfolio update – April 2021”

Posted on

Portfolio update – March 2021

Dear fellow investors, friends, family and future self.

Welcome to my third portfolio update or the year 2021, I hope you enjoy them. Now let’s get into things!

March was a good month: I’ve started the real work for the project at work, I can say I like it, even though that this requires more meetings and video calls fatigue is a real thing, a day full of video calls wears you down. Regarding the startup, things are on track, we are developing our product. I (together with my partner) joined a Startup Mentorship Programme, it should help us in our journey. Investments wise, there was a drop in the market and I took advantage and bought some individual stocks. We’ll se how they perform in the following month and years.

Continue reading “Portfolio update – March 2021”

Posted on

Portfolio update – February 2021

Dear fellow investors, friends, family and future self.

Welcome to my second portfolio update or the year 2021, I hope you enjoy them. Now let’s get into things!

February was a good month professionally: I’ve started the new project, it involves doing more work that requires communication rather than technical stuff, but it’s something that I enjoy so far. The startup that I’ve started with my friend seems to be a good idea, we already have two investors that promised to fund us for this year! Yey, exciting times ahead! Investment wise, this month was not so great, basically I’ve lost some money on the shares that I’ve bought, including a marked loss of 100€ on GameStop (note to myself: don’t speculate on the stock market). I would have been better off if I’ve invested this money in a ETF, but I want to get some knowledge in how to invest in the stock market anyhow.

Continue reading “Portfolio update – February 2021”

Posted on

Portfolio update – January 2021

Dear fellow investors, friends, family and future self.

Welcome to my first portfolio update or the year 2021, I hope you enjoy them. Now let’s get into things!

January 2021 was a very good month, not especially in the financial terms, but in terms of new opportunities. I would say the year 2021 started very strong, with more opportunities arising than ever before. I’ve tested the waters of freelance after many years of pause and managed to get my first contract (that ended after one week at the client’s request, doesn’t matter, the first step was made). Also, in my day job I got a new project with a new position that I haven’t done it before, so I am pretty excited about that also. And, to top it all up, a friend came up with a business idea and from the end of the month we are working on our startup.

Continue reading “Portfolio update – January 2021”

Posted on

Portfolio update – December 2020

Dear fellow investors, friends, family and future self.

Welcome to my first portfolio update, I hope you will enjoy them from now on. Now let’s get into things!

December 2020 was an OKish month, I was a little pissed that I had to pay back to the Taxman (Finanzamt in Germany) around 1500€ for year 2019. I don’t know, maybe there is some optimisation that I can make, for the taxes in 2020 I will use a financial advisor, because I have a more complicated situation anyhow.

Continue reading “Portfolio update – December 2020”