🌊 The Comfort of Simplicity (and Its Trap)
When most beginners ask me how to start investing, they expect me to hand them a magic stock ticker. Instead, I point them to ETFs.
Why? Because ETFs are like sturdy ships, diversified, resilient, and easier to manage than picking every plank of wood yourself.
But here’s the catch: not all ships are seaworthy. Some ETFs look safe but quietly drag your returns down with hidden fees, poor structure, or overhyped themes. Choosing the wrong one is like boarding a ship with a hole just below the waterline.
⚓ Why Many Investors Pick the Wrong ETFs
They chase themes. AI, cannabis, space, metaverse, sounds exciting, but often ends up as expensive speculation.
They ignore costs. A 0.5% fee looks small… until you compound it over 20 years.
They overlap too much. Many ETFs hold the same top 10 stocks. Owning five of them isn’t diversification.
They forget taxes. Not all ETFs are tax-efficient for Europeans.
They confuse popularity with quality. The biggest isn’t always the best.
🧭 The Ark’s Top 5 ETFs
These aren’t “hot tips.” They’re solid vessels designed for different buckets of your wealth.
1. VWCE (Vanguard FTSE All-World UCITS ETF)
🌍 Global equity exposure in one ETF.
Low cost (~0.22%). UCITS-compliant.
Core Growth Bucket.
2. CSPX (iShares Core S&P 500 UCITS ETF, Accumulating)
🇺🇸 Tracks the S&P 500, tax-efficient for Europeans (accumulating).
Strong historical compounding.
Growth + Legacy Bucket.
3. VUAA (Vanguard S&P 500 UCITS ETF, Accumulating)
Alternative to CSPX, slightly different structure but same logic.
Ideal for retirement accounts.
4. VHYL (Vanguard FTSE All-World High Dividend Yield UCITS ETF)
💰 Global dividend exposure for passive income.
Income Bucket (payout focus).
5. IEMG or EMIM (iShares Emerging Markets ETFs)
📈 Emerging markets exposure (Asia, LatAm).
Higher volatility, but diversifies global growth.
Satellite Growth Bucket.
🚫 ETFs to Avoid in 2025
Overhyped thematic ETFs (AI, blockchain, cannabis, metaverse): High fees, low returns.
Niche single-country ETFs: Too risky unless you already have a strong core.
ETFs with TER > 0.6%: Fees quietly kill compounding.
Synthetic replication ETFs: Unless you understand the structure, stick to physical replication.
💰 Wealth Management Lens
ETFs aren’t just “cheap stock baskets.” They’re the building blocks of long-term wealth systems.
Growth Bucket → VWCE, CSPX/VUAA, EMIM.
Income Bucket → VHYL.
Security Bucket → Pair with cash or short-term bonds ETF.
Legacy Bucket → Accumulating ETFs for estate/retirement.
👉 Choosing ETFs isn’t about hype, it’s about aligning your wealth buckets to your North Star.
✍️ Quick Exercise
Write down your North Star goal (e.g., retire at 60 with €1M).
Assign each of your ETFs to one of the 4 buckets: Growth, Income, Security, or Legacy.
If one bucket is empty, decide whether to add an ETF or rebalance.
📊 Ark Deep Dive: The Fee Trap
If you invest €100,000 for 20 years at 7% annual growth:
At 0.20% fees → You keep ~€386,000.
At 0.60% fees → You keep ~€349,000.
That’s €37,000 lost. Fees are silent storms — respect them.
💡 Contrarian Take
👉 “Most investors don’t need 10 ETFs. They need 2–3 carefully chosen ones.”
🚀 Take Action Today
Audit your ETF holdings: check costs, overlaps, and purpose.
Assign each ETF to a wealth bucket.
Cut out the overhyped, expensive ones.
👉 Want to see how I use ETFs in practice? Copy my portfolio on eToro to follow my allocations in real time.
🔮 Next Week on The Wealth’s Ark
“Your Relationship with Money: Fix This, Fix Everything”
Because wealth starts in the mind long before it shows in the portfolio.
✅ Free Resource for This Issue
ETF Selection Cheat Sheet — Green flags, red flags, and a bucket-mapping template for your ETF picks.
