Ethical trading app - any good?

[Consept]

So just came across this app called my tickr, basically it's an investment app that only invests into ethical businesses for you. So you put however much you want, you can also set it to pay in monthly, they put your money into a fund that invests into businesses like clean energy or sustainable farming or whatever. 

Recently I've been getting my head into learning about stocks and longer term investments, my only issue with normal investing was potentially to reap a good return you might have to invest in businesses that are essentially contributing to damaging the planet or have terrible working conditions. So I wouldve looked specifically for more ethical businesses anyway. 

So question is, can you actually make a decent return on this and has anyone tried it? I'm very tempted to just lump a load of cash in but if its not actually gonna grow I'd rather just give some to charity and invest in other things 

@Average Investor I'm looking at you 

https://yourmoney.lumio-app.com/tickr-review/

 

Edited February 23, 2021 by Consept

[Average Investor]

That would likely be a good way to help spot and support companies that are more green. Some concerns like fees would come to mind for me.

Quote

For accounts worth less than £3,000, there are no annual platform fees. If you have more than £3,000 in your account, you are charged an extra 0.30% calculated on any amount over £3,000. The previous pricing involved a flat 0.70% fee for all accounts.

These fees are just for an account! There are good brokers in the US that charge no fees. You should be able to access some. 

 

Quote

The only other expense comes from the provider of the investments. Depending on the theme you pick, expenses can range from 0.25%-0/49% per year.

  Here in the Us I can get all top 500 companies in an ETF with a .03% Annual fee. However, keep in mind that generally smaller ETFs are going to cost more, but I would not want anything over .1%. 

 

Also, yes I would sweat it the closer you get to a 1% fee. That really starts killing your returns over a long period of time and it compounds. 

I personally don't see anything too special on this app. However, if could help show you some companies to look into if you want green energy, but someone on youtube could show you. You could find low fee clean energy ETFs. 

I try not to get too crazy, when it comes to ethics. When I buy something like the S&P 500 I am only in so much control through my money. I hope that mankind as a whole is working towards a cleaner and more conscious future. However, I know that not all of the companies there are doing this. On the other hand a lot of the services are needed. For example we could not just give up oil right now. Even though a lot of those companies do a lot of immoral things. I wouldn't directly put money into a tobacco company or something though. 

I highly suggest reading the intelligent investor by benjamin grahm if you want to learn to set up for investments well. I've invested in other markets, but this year was my first in stocks. I used the techniques in the book and I have got about a 75% return on investment. 

I also want to share that I have found that too much time in investments really detracts from working on a LP. The knowledge is good though. It is hard to help anyone with no money. Learning to have money work for you makes a big difference. Just be careful not to get sucked into it too deep. 

Edited February 23, 2021 by Average Investor

[AdamDiC]

just buy the nasdaq 100...

[Consept]

@Average Investor

Thanks for you reply man 

10 hours ago, Average Investor said:

These fees are just for an account! There are good brokers in the US that charge no fees. You should be able to access some. 

true, to be honest im still learning about the fees and what not but looking into it you are right the fees are a bit too high and theres not really a need for it to be like that as i could just invest in the same etfs on a different platform for a fraction of the cost. I think the thinking behind the fees and the company itself is its more for people who are first time investors and maybe want most of the work done for them, but want to invest in things that are good for the earth. Green level people basically, i think it is a good idea from that perspective, but for those that know a bit about investing they probably wouldnt bother with it. 

 

10 hours ago, Average Investor said:

I personally don't see anything too special on this app. However, if could help show you some companies to look into if you want green energy, but someone on youtube could show you. You could find low fee clean energy ETFs. 

After a little digging i found out what funds they were investing in, so i may just put a little into them aside from the app. 

 

10 hours ago, Average Investor said:

I try not to get too crazy, when it comes to ethics. When I buy something like the S&P 500 I am only in so much control through my money. I hope that mankind as a whole is working towards a cleaner and more conscious future. However, I know that not all of the companies there are doing this. On the other hand a lot of the services are needed. For example we could not just give up oil right now. Even though a lot of those companies do a lot of immoral things. I wouldn't directly put money into a tobacco company or something though. 

I get you, it is hard to invest in the stock market and be completely ethical or even think about being ethical, its not something i wouldve thought about before, also there pros and cons of every business. But i would like to have some kind of intention to invest in businesses that at least dont cause crazy damage to the earth or exploit workers or whatever, its not gonna be easy and i mean i sell on amazon where i know there are people getting exploited so its not always easy to avoid. 

 

10 hours ago, Average Investor said:

I highly suggest reading the intelligent investor by benjamin grahm if you want to learn to set up for investments well. I've invested in other markets, but this year was my first in stocks. I used the techniques in the book and I have got about a 75% return on investment. 

I also want to share that I have found that too much time in investments really detracts from working on a LP. The knowledge is good though. It is hard to help anyone with no money. Learning to have money work for you makes a big difference. Just be careful not to get sucked into it too deep. 

Yeah im currently reading it, you advised me on it before so appreciate the recommendation and im learning a lot so far. I also take your point on the distraction, I always try and be conscious of slipping down that rabbit hole of finance and making money, at least mentally anyway. It can be very difficult as its almost like a great puzzle for the mind, theres so much to learn and work out, but ultimately it could just bring money which obviously is necessary but not everything. I havent fully defined my LP yet but I wouldnt mind if it was based around helping others to financial freedom and out of wage slavery so this learning process could help with that anyway. Out of interest, whats your LP? no worries if you dont want to share it 

[Consept]

39 minutes ago, datamonster said:

Absolutely! Clean energy, sustainability, etc. are mega trends that will probably become even more relevant in the future. Just be aware that this is a sector bet.

If you make such an investment, you're placing a bet that the sustainability sector will become more important in the future. This may be likely, but not guaranteed, of course.

If you want less risk (also less return), you could invest in a globally diversified ETF, for example based on the MSCI World that seeks to reflect the 1600 largest companies in the world regardless of their industry. But then you might get more exposure to companies you might not like 100%. So, up to you...

Thanks for tips man. Yeah i was looking into these ETFS, I do like the clean energy one just because i really believe the world is going in that direction. The UK has set quite high carbon targets for 2030, i also see electric cars becoming much more prominent in the next few years as also here in the UK theyve said theyll be a ban on the sale of all new petrol and diesel cars and thats from a conservative, center right government. Also more young people are gonna be green as you see from voting trends from young people voting in a huge majority for Sanders and Corbyn.  Having said that im obviously not going to put all into these funds but ill put a decent amount. Im thinking also tech and then a bit in gold and sliver just to back it up. 

What do you think in general about ETFs? I want a few investments where i can put the money in and just let them do their thing, as i understand it the best way to to do this is putting it into an index or on ETF. Also do you evaluate an ETF differently to a stock, i was looking at P/E ratios but i dont know if it works the same with etfs. Getting a little technical but you are the data monster 

[Consept]

6 minutes ago, datamonster said:

I can't give you any investment advice, but I can tell you what I do. I have about 10 months of salaries saved in cash just in case.

With the money I have on top of that I invest 80% of it in two ETFs every month:

• MSCI World (70%): Covers the 1600 largest companies in the world in developed countries
• MSCI Emerging Markets (30%): Covers more than 1000 largest companies in emerging markets (China, India, Korea, Brazil, etc.)

So, with just these two ETFs, I'm pretty well diversified across the whole global economy. For this, I don't check the current prices or anything. I completely automated this and don't even think about it. It just works every month as soon as my salary comes in.

The remaining 20% I invest a bit more actively in different things like individual stocks, a NASDAQ100 ETF, individual stocks, crypto and a bit private equity. This is far more risky and I do it more for fun.

Yes, I don't care about these ratios with ETFs. I'm are interested in:

• What companies, markets and industries does the ETF invest in?
• What's the asset allocation?
• What are the costs (TER)?
• What's the fund volume?
• Is it distributing or accumulating? I prefer accumulating ones
• What's the fund domicile? I prefer Irish ones for tax reasons

Thing like that.

Excellent, thats very helpful, thanks! Are you happy with the returns youre getting on your portfolio?

At the moment it seems like its impossible to open up a trading account with anyone because of all the robin hood stuff, but as soon as all that calms down im gonna work out some kind of strategy to put some funds in. 

 

[LfcCharlie4]

One word if you wanna do ethical investing- 

 

CRYPTO. 

Still early in the Bull-Run imo. 

This shit is changing EVERY aspect of the world. Just look at Charles Hoskinson's life vision with Cardano essentially transforming Africa. 

Bitcoin Cash is making electronic payments MUCH easier 

VeChain is upgrading supply chain management through the use of the blockchain 

I'm so biased, but still, worth checking out, it's basically my second job at this point lmao 

[Consept]

5 hours ago, LfcCharlie4 said:

One word if you wanna do ethical investing- 

 

CRYPTO. 

Still early in the Bull-Run imo. 

This shit is changing EVERY aspect of the world. Just look at Charles Hoskinson's life vision with Cardano essentially transforming Africa. 

Bitcoin Cash is making electronic payments MUCH easier 

VeChain is upgrading supply chain management through the use of the blockchain 

I'm so biased, but still, worth checking out, it's basically my second job at this point lmao 

Im not an expert but I agree in that i think eventually some kind of crypto currency could be the main or at least a widely used currency but i think we're some ways off that. I think the value is really pumped up just really based in either emotions or whales that are aware of the emotions. 

But thats not to say you cant be smart and make money in the market, you definitely can, i would just be wary of looking at it as a mid to long term investment, which is really what im on the look out for. Theres a couple red flags for me, one is that 1000 people own 40% of bitcoin, meaning if a couple cash out it could really tank the stock. Also its not based on any asset or anything really, at least if a companys stock goes down it can usually recover as theres an actual company behind it, whereas if bitcoin completely crashes it will just evaporate in to thin air. I dont really get how it can be used for payments now as the price fluctuates so much, imagine you sell a car for £20k in bitcoin today and tomorrow that £20k is worth £4k. It is true cash is also based on faith as well but really cash isnt regarded as an asset its just a means to buy assets, whereas people are treating bitcoin as an asset in of itself. 

I dont know man it jut feels a bit like the dotcom bubble and the subprime crash, like everyones getting rich but at some point the bubble will burst. 

I am probably a bit biased against it as i just cant see myself putting money into it beyond a speculative %. But how do you make money from it personally just out of interest, and what kind of returns have you seen? 

[Average Investor]

@Consept Really glad you followed up with that book and what I shared previously. I agree with what you said here. 

I currently have most of my IRA investment in the best malls in the world. The malls are set to be run fully on green energy by 2025 I believe. A good portion of the portfolio already using fully sustainable energy. However, one large thing is that a lot of the retailers in the mall are into a lot of practices that are unethical and toxic. Things like the clothes making is absolutely terrible for the environment. I can't say they are totally and completely bad either though. Thing is I invest into the real estate. If everyone started demanding large yoga studios, meditation centers, libraries, retreat centers, etc there it would be totally different. 

A lot of what I have learned is just time in the market triumphs timing the market or building out elaborate schemes. Just simply gathering a large understanding of what you are investing in will be plentiful returns. Building out a plan and sticking with that plan no matter how emotional you may feel. 

 

On 2/24/2021 at 2:22 AM, Consept said:

Out of interest, whats your LP?

I'm working through doing the life purpose course right now. I've read a good chunk of the books on there. I am actively working on it every day. I absolutely love teaching other people stuff and my strongest strength is input of information. I have been training for over a year in toastmasters with public speaking. I am reading books on it and training every week. I am working on building out a full vision of what I want exactly still. However, I  can see the next thing I go into would be teaching personal development full time. I can see there is a lot of stuff for me to break through personally to get to the level I want. I have already experimented with shooting the videos and all that and I did like it. Now into any sort of specific niche I am not sure. I still have a lot more to work on, but I feel I am in the right area. The public speaking is the first time in a while I couldn't sleep over thinking about how happy I was from doing it. 

I definitely ponder it a lot and have some doubts. I ideally want to make something different. However, I want to work on building out good skills and finding what I love. 

I'm having a lot of fun in the process. Breaking a lot of barriers that I didn't think I would be hitting working on this stuff. So much internal resistances to work though. 

[Consept]

1 hour ago, Average Investor said:

The public speaking is the first time in a while I couldn't sleep over thinking about how happy I was from doing it. 

I definitely ponder it a lot and have some doubts. I ideally want to make something different. However, I want to work on building out good skills and finding what I love. 

I'm having a lot of fun in the process. Breaking a lot of barriers that I didn't think I would be hitting working on this stuff. So much internal resistances to work though. 

Thats excellent to hear bro, that feeling when you cant sleep because youve broken some personal barrier is an amazing feeling and in my opinion confirms youre in the right path. A lot of the time the journey is worth it alone but when the times right something will come along that just makes complete sense. Keep pushing and enjoy it bro. 

1 hour ago, datamonster said:

No man, all your concerns about crypto are completely legitimate imo. I share @LfcCharlie4's view that they are ethical and could even contribute to making the world a much better and less corrupt place.

I agree it could contribute to making the world a better place but the current adoption shows the orange level we're at, at the moment, it is a game changer in terms of the technology and ideal behind it, but its too early for us currently. 

1 hour ago, datamonster said:

For me they form just a small part of my strategy and I'm completely fine financially if Bitcoin goes to zero. I started investing in it when it was around 6k, so returns have been great in relative terms, but as I mentioned, I didn't put a lot of money, and I'm not planning to sell anyways.

To be fair i guess its worth a gamble if youre not using a good chunk of your capital, definitely would be at 6k or lower. You not tempted to sell now though? that would be nice profit

[LfcCharlie4]

On 2/25/2021 at 4:39 PM, Consept said:

Im not an expert but I agree in that i think eventually some kind of crypto currency could be the main or at least a widely used currency but i think we're some ways off that. I think the value is really pumped up just really based in either emotions or whales that are aware of the emotions. 

But thats not to say you cant be smart and make money in the market, you definitely can, i would just be wary of looking at it as a mid to long term investment, which is really what im on the look out for. Theres a couple red flags for me, one is that 1000 people own 40% of bitcoin, meaning if a couple cash out it could really tank the stock. Also its not based on any asset or anything really, at least if a companys stock goes down it can usually recover as theres an actual company behind it, whereas if bitcoin completely crashes it will just evaporate in to thin air. I dont really get how it can be used for payments now as the price fluctuates so much, imagine you sell a car for £20k in bitcoin today and tomorrow that £20k is worth £4k. It is true cash is also based on faith as well but really cash isnt regarded as an asset its just a means to buy assets, whereas people are treating bitcoin as an asset in of itself. 

I dont know man it jut feels a bit like the dotcom bubble and the subprime crash, like everyones getting rich but at some point the bubble will burst. 

I am probably a bit biased against it as i just cant see myself putting money into it beyond a speculative %. But how do you make money from it personally just out of interest, and what kind of returns have you seen? 

 

Sorry but I couldn't disagree more. 

Honestly, idc about Bitcoin, this is unpopular but I think BTC is simply just the first & the biggest, hence its popularity, its technology is still First-Gen & you're 100% it won't be used for payments and has deviated from Satoshi's original white paper of Peer-Peer Decentralized Cash& many see it as 'Digital gold' now. I'm more talking about a range of different Cryptos with Real World use cases, I don't have much of my portfolio in BTC & even from a gains standpoint it's already at $45k, to just 2x your money you're talking close to 100k BTC, whereas coins like ADA, DOT, LINK, ZIL, BCH, VET, THETA, TFUEL etc have much more chance of getting much greater gains in my opinion, some as close to 10x, compared to just the 10% you see from 'Index Fund Investing' which is great if you're already rich, but wil take a loooooooooooooooong time to make you rich.

In terms of the bubble bursting, you're kind of right but this is where you need to do more research and you'll understand how the cycles work. It works in 4 year cycles based on BTC halving, and atm the market kinda lags behind BTC (for the most part, hopefully will change in coming decades), and the last halving was 11th May 2020, the 'Peak' of this cycle could be anywhere from Sept 2021-Sept 2022, each analyst has their own thoughts, but dates aren't really that important, what's important is this- 

If BTC goes up 100% in 7 days (or less) that is the signal for Euphoria in the markets, and time to take the rest of your profits, as this is what has happened in the previous cycles to indicate the 'peak.' Alt coins (every other coin) basically lags a month / two behind, like XRP going to $3 in the last cycle . 

You will never ever ever sell right at the top, and you should be taking profits anyways throughout, but the goal is to sell during Euphoria, and then wait for the inevitable retracement & build your bags during the bear market for the next Bull Market.

@360_Trader on Twitter explains this FARR better than I can as well, it's his life's work lol, and you should see the messages he gets from people who were in Poverty, now financially free, millionaires from this cycle etc etc 

How you make money from it- 

Capital Gains like any investment- Remember if you're in the UK any profits you realize are taxed 20%. This is of course where the majority of gains are made. E.g. Invest 10k in BTC, it goes to 20k you make 10k- 8k after tax. (unless you become a resident of Portgual lmao) 

Staking- There's coins like ZILIQA you can stake on certain wallets and get interest, for example, with ZIL you get 15% per year, paid out daily & you also get GZIL so it's closer to 20%, this will go down as more people stake, so by next year will probs be more like 10%. 

Trading- I don't trade, occasionally swing trade, but that's with like a tiny % for fun, I'm always working on my businesses so don't have time to learn trading, nor do I want to atm. 

I started last year based on my business partners recommendations with BTC, Ethereum & Chainlink. That original investment has more than 5xed at this point, if only I put in more lmao. I started getting addicted to it end of December / start of January, and since that round of investing, without going into how much, I've roughly doubled my money again. 

I'm quite happy to accept risk as I'm only 21 so I get if you aren't, but to me, this is the greatest wealth transfer in history, and one of the best ways to become a Millionaire without investing for 40 years (of course have your retirement accounts set up through your Tax Free isa anyways, but that's a different discussion lmao) 

So, yeah, if you ask me if I think it's 'Risky' my answer is NO, considering we printed 25%+ of all $ in circulation last year, the USD is only backed by Debt, I think it's far more risky to leave lots of Cash laying around in central banks doing fuck all. 

I would also look into Silver & Gold. 

Once you realize how fucked and corrupt the system is, you stop seeing Fiat as the safe option, and see it as the true risky play, which I know can sound radical and something I would've never said a few months ago, but all the things with Wall Street Bets, Silver Squeeze, Stimulus Checks etc are starting to highlight the unreal levels of corruption in the global economy. 

 

Sorry for the super long answer, but quite a lot of what you said is exactly what I thought before delving deep into this the last few months, also, lastly on your point about being early- GOOD, that's exactly where you want to be. The early bird gets the worm as they say, and the best time to invest was 10 years ago, the second best time is now of course!  

[LfcCharlie4]

On 2/26/2021 at 6:31 AM, datamonster said:

No, I meant I invested when the BTC price was around 6000 EUR. But I invested less than that. 

I'm not tempted to sell because I really believe in the use case of Bitcoin and Litecoin and I hope to actually use it in the future. Maybe that day never comes though 

I also find ETH and its technology super fascinating. It's already being used a lot to verify ownership of things like artworks via block chain and purchase it online. But honestly I don't understand this area well enough yet.

Also Bitcoin, like Gold are rather safe from inflation.

 

If you think BTC & ETH's tech are good look into Bitcoin Cash, Cardano, Ziliqa, Theta, TFuel etc

These are their current prices 

BCH- $450 (I'm actually being paid in this instead of $ by all my clients who I do coaching work with in my business, it is SO much easier than PayPal & transferring currencies) 

ADA- $1.24 

Theta- $3 / TFuel (Theta Fuel)- $0.01 

ZIL- $0.11

VET- $.038 

Let's come back to this near the end of the cycle and see where they all are  

Just for comparisons sake

BTC- $44,500 

ETH- $1400 

 

Personally, I think the 5 I mentioned will see better gains from here, but I could be very very wrong & of course this isn't financial advice, just a random Crypto Addicts opinion

[weridikka]

On 25.02.2021 at 1:30 PM, LfcCharlie4 said:

One word if you wanna do ethical investing- 

 

CRYPTO. 

Still early in the Bull-Run imo. 

This shit is changing EVERY aspect of the world. Just look at Charles Hoskinson's life vision with Cardano essentially transforming Africa. 

Bitcoin Cash is making electronic payments MUCH easier 

VeChain is upgrading supply chain management through the use of the blockchain 

I'm so biased, but still, worth checking out, it's basically my second job at this point lmao 

I recently read an interview with one of the financial analysts and crypto. And he spoke of a negative outlook.
What do you think is beneficial or not? What will the future be like?

[LfcCharlie4]

@weridikka Personally I disagree massively, most traditional financial sectors don’t really understand Crypto, the market cycles, the technology or any of the projects that well. 
 

IMO (not financial advice) I think we are still early in the bull cycle, in the 2017 bull run BTC had several big corrections (20-30%) and in normal markets this is HUGE, but in crypto this is normal just like a 2x return on a stock in one year is insane, in crypto it’s not that impressive. 
 

I ofc can’t predict the future, but going by market cycles, there will likely be a 40-60% pullback when this cycle ends & we go into “Cycle 4” before the next halving. 
 

in the long term, the BTC halving will have less effect as the market matures& less & less BTC is available to be mined. 
 

and, in my opinion lots of projects are quite literally going to change the world& how things are done& these are the projects and coins to focus on, ones that have real world use cases & solve problems