What if I told you that there was one ETF that would provide with a growing and consistent stream of dividends, decent capital growth, alongside protection in down markets? Well, I think that I have found one such ETF. It is called the iShares Core Dividend Growth ETF, or DGRO. It is very different from the more well known SCHD, which tracks the highest yielders in the market. As most of us know, high yields are often unsustainable, because the payout ratio is too high; or th

I recently brought some more Infratil after its share price declined from a high of $16.14 to around $13. Its share price now is trading at a significant discount to its net asset value of $16.26. I have increased my shareholding in IFT by about a third. They are one of NZ's largest listed companies, with a current market cap of $13.2B NZD. They have $20.6B in total assets. These assets consist of CDC Data Centres, which is almost 50% of the portfolio. The next largest asset

One of the things that is very hard with investing in the share market is dealing with volatility. Stocks and ETFs go up and down in price every weekday, and it can be hard to not want constantly to buy and sell. But history has taught us that you are often better to sit and do nothing. Warren Buffett has said that you should be ok for the market to close for a decade. I for one am guilty for looking at the market every day, and I shouldn't. It is common human phycology for

For centuries gold has been seen as the ultimate store of wealth, and for many people in developing countries around the world, gold is still seen as the best way to preserve your capital. Some of the best things about holding gold are that it offers a counterbalance to the volatile equity markets and that it has been a great way to protect your capital against inflation. But gold had a 66% rise in 2025, and has come down 25%+ from its 2026 highs, so has gold suddenly become

The headline photo is this blog is very apt for the title. Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway is part of the reason that I feel like I have been missing out. I brought BKB.b at the start of last year. I thought that its cash pile would protect me if the market went down, and its portfolio of stocks would enable me to ride the market if it continued going up. As it turns out, I was right about the first part of that sentence, but I was wrong about the second part. It's portfo

Now called SGH, Seven Group Holdings is a diversified asset manager with a market cap of $19.05B. Their holdings comprise of Westrac at 41.5%, Boral at 30.4%, Coates at 18.8%, SGH and Beach Energy at 8.8%, and Seven West Media at 2.7%. Although its Media holdings will soon be reduced to 1.35%, as Southern Cross Media is acquiring a majority shareholding. In my last blog, I wrote that 90% of their businesses were dependent on a strong mining industry, this is not true. Westrac

In the last few months, I have been doing some selling. I sold Dicker Data and my entire position in the Australian Resources index. In retrospect I maybe should have sold the Resources index in 2 lots, as it has continued to move higher. What I decided is that as commodities are cyclical, it was good to get out while the getting was good. The flip side of this, is that now I have all of this cash in my ASX account. In my NZX account, I have also built up a cash position, as

As you may have guessed by the image, I am feeling a bit of regret that I didn't buy Rocket LAB (RKLB). Its share price has tripled this past year and doubled over the past month. I had some money in my Hatch account a couple of months ago and decided to buy some Nvidia (finally). It is sitting at around break-even after a couple of months, and will likely have a good 2026, Rocket Lab would obviously have doubled my money had I brought them instead. The main reason why Rocket

In a 2013 letter to Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders Warren Buffett said that upon his passing, he would be instructing his wife to put 90% of his cash into a low-cost market index fund i.e. VOO or VTI, and 10% into short-term government bonds. I have discussed before how a high stock market allocation is the biggest factor in determining your long-term gains. But I have also discussed how some exposure to a low-volatility bond fund can help to reduce your portfolio fluctuatio

Developed by Scott Burns in January 1985, the Couch Potato Portfolio can be created with 2 ETFs. In designing the portfolio, he said that the selection of the specific ETFs isn't overly important. What is important is that one ETF comprises a broad selection of bonds, while the other comprises a broad selection of stocks. A typical design of the portfolio would be the VTI (Vanguard US Total Market) and TIPS (iShares all bond fund). This portfolio has a 20-year 7.41% compound

One of the best things that I have found about using Hnry , besides being able to create really professional looking invoices, is being able to claim back the GST expenses on my business costs. The reason I am writing this now is because I got a surprising GST refund a few days ago. I had thought that you only got your GST around April/May, but this week I was proven wrong. I claimed half of my phone as a business expense (as I use the Hnry app and communicate with customers

There is one passive portfolio strategy which has been widely used by investment professionals for as long as I can remember. And it is the old 60:40 stocks/bonds portfolio. The 60% stock potion is there as the growth portion, while the 40% bond portion is there to provide protection in the event of a market drawdown. Ray Dalio's All-Weather takes the approach to balance the proportions according to risk. So, alongside the 15% weighting for gold and commodities, the stock wei

I have been thinking that since gold and stocks are at all-time highs right now, it might make sense to wait in out in low volatility SHY...

After writing the article a few days ago, I have continued to look at how Ray Dalio's portfolio would hold up during different markets....

I have recently opened a brokerage account with Interactive Brokers (IBKR) , which is now listed on this website. I did so mainly due to...

On the prompting of Sam Stubbs awful comments about Charlie Kirk, I changed my Kiwisaver from Simplicity Growth to Milford Aggressive. I...

I first brought Spark four or five years ago, when I saw how much they dominated NZ's mobile phone market. And for a few years, they were...

The title here is a bit misleading. I didn't so much as change my mind about Fonterra, as recognize that its share price has moved beyond...

So, at the moment with my remaining investment cash, I have decided to place a limit order on buying more FSF (Fonterra Shareholder Fund)...

After the last article I wrote, I have been thinking whether or not I need to open a new brokerage account. The fact is that Hatch works...