This EasyVestor's portfolio is on fire

EasyVestor portfolio

EasyVestor portfolios are on fire and like Michael Parkes, the 30-year-old from the Mother City, who has been taking full advantage of the opportunities the market has thrown at him.

Michael has been investing for 12 year now and his first ever shares he purchased was in Old Mutual, “I remember e-mailing investment advisers for advice and when they found out I only had R1000 to invest, they all stopped replying.” I am sure Michael is glad EasyEquities came about?

Michael has been kind enough to share some of his portfolio holdings with EasyResearch in the efforts to help and inform new budding EasyVestors on the platform.

Portfolio insights

I use fundamental analysis to decide on which stocks to buy and then technical analysis to decide at what price to get in (yawn). I generally stick to the American market and to be honest with the market the way it is at the moment, it’s almost as if earnings don’t matter.

I also look at companies still making losses but with the potential to disrupt, something like Appian and Lemonade have done very nicely for me and they are (I hope) just getting started.

Top portfolio holdings

Michael’s top portfolio holdings are spread across different U.S sectors and include:

Lemonade Inc (LMND), Appian Corp (APPN), MercadoLibre Inc (MELI), The Boeing Company (BA), ARK Innovation ETF (ARKK), Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings (NCLH). I would love to say Tesla, but it’s done so well for me that I’m too nervous to buy or sell any more.

The market has been so hot since March 2020, it almost feels too good to be true, but I can’t sit on the side lines even if I tried. I am holding long term and buying more whenever I have a few cents to my name.

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Technology is the future so I think shares like Lemonade and Appian will do great over the next 5- 10 years. Especially because they are moving into new industries, like insurance, which have pretty much been the same for the last 20 years. Lemonade is up 50% already this year though so things definitely move quickly in this market.

MercadoLibre has had a fantastic run for the last 2 years and I have recently added some more, we’ve seen in America the success Amazon has had and although we’ll never have an exact copy of Amazon, e-commerce is the future so I think this will do pretty well.

I also have some Jumia, but I think they might have a rockier road ahead of them. I wait for the dips and add to both but I’m more focused on Mercado for now, plus it has a cool name.

Boeing and Norwegian have had a tough 2020 because of COVID-19, especially because an airplane and cruise ship are probably the last places you want to be during a pandemic (I recently flew to Dubai and 8 hours with a mask on is terrible) but that is exactly why I bought them. Those are my longer-term recovery plays. I also seriously doubt the American government would ever let Boeing go bankrupt.

Being South African I know a thing or two about a government which does not allow things to go bankrupt, so I almost feel like an expert in the field.

Ark Innovation ETF – It had an amazing year, I think it did 120%, I like the fact that its actively managed and innovation is never going out of fashion, so I am in this for the long run. Ark seem to know what they are doing and I like Cathie Wood a lot. They are working on a Space ETF as well, which is probably going to be the next big thing. I am always looking at the ARK ETF’s and you could probably choose any of them and do very well.

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Performance

Last year was definitely a very interesting one! Despite the pandemic and collapse of my social life with lockdown and all, there were some highlights. My portfolio returned 120% for the year – one of the best years of my life (investment wise). Top performers were Tesla, Appian, Bitcoin and Zoom. I have since sold out of Zoom and reinvested in the above, which I think have a great year ahead of them.

Objectives for 2021

In terms of goals for 2021, I always try and outperform the S&P 500, as well as the traditional South African Fund Manager’s offshore funds. You may know them, the ones who spend more money on advertising than on innovative investments, the same ones who charge 2% per year and don’t even beat their benchmark? The ones who compare their portfolio performance to inflation on their fund’s fact sheet. Yes, those ones.

Outlook

Moving on…It’s always difficult to predict what a year may bring, considering potential hiccups in the Covid vaccine roll-out, political uncertainty and the (apparent) rise of Emerging Markets.

If you were to press me, I would say my targeted return for the year is 40% excluding Bitcoin, which hopefully hits $50 000 sometime this year.

I have tried to strike a balance between the “re-opening plays” such as Boeing, Carnival and Norwegian Cruise Lines whilst still staying true to tech and what I think will be the future disruptors and growth stocks of tomorrow. Inevitably there will be some laggards in my portfolio but the benefit of holding 20-25 stocks is you’re always diversified and if done correctly, your winners will far outweigh your losers. 

Let’s see how it goes, if you see me on Instagram posting photos from the South of France, you’ll know I achieved my goals, one thing is for sure though… I’ll definitely have a better year than the MTI founder.

New to investing

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Take note that all stock data was taken on 19 January 2021.

Michael Parkes

EasyVestor