40. MoneyWalker
The greatest strength of our forum is its high-quality investment and financial writings, which bring a lot of added value to all kinds of different investors—such writings are provided, among others, by the user MoneyWalker. He has opened interesting threads about companies and various investment topics, and in addition, he has written well-structured, high-quality posts about various companies that have certainly provided added value even to analysts.
Sippola has also mentioned this user to me in a positive light, and I am not surprised at all; this guy seems to follow the investment world broadly from various perspectives, which has probably helped him produce very content-rich messages.
MW is a high-quality writer who hasn’t become familiar to me at least as an investor or a person… although his excellent posts have given me a very strong impression that he is a very smart investor.
1. In thirty words, tell us who you are.
A fifty-year-old family man living in the Helsinki metropolitan area, having spent his childhood in various parts of Finland, an entrepreneur, and a Master of Science in Information Technology. Worked with information systems in many different roles both as an employee and an entrepreneur. Invested for a long time, but with poor success.
2. Tell us three things that forum members don’t know about you.
I invested in options in the 80s and naturally suffered losses 
I coded trading systems in the 90s.
I think a car is a good investment if it brings you pleasure. 
3. What interests and hobbies do you have? You are not allowed to mention anything related to investing.
I love moving in nature regardless of the season and weather. Working out and music have always been a part of my life. I have taken up listening to audiobooks. But family is the meaning of my life.
4. What is your typical weekday like?
From 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. I do my day job mostly remotely. I exercise in between. In the evening I practice investing and spend time with my family. My life is steady and healthy without major work-related drama.
5. Could you describe what kind of an investor you are?
I am a hardworking and increasingly patient growth investor. Dividends do not interest me at all. Due to lack of time, I hardly swing trade anymore, and I no longer engage in day trading. I can invest in cyclicals if I understand the industry’s cycle. Investing is a pleasant lifestyle and a livelihood for me, not just a hobby.
6. Could you share what your investment history looks like?
I started investing at age 14 with my summer job earnings. I used the accumulated savings to finance my studies. I failed to avoid Black Monday in 1987. That was terribly annoying, but afterwards I heard that the crash came as a surprise to everyone. I still don’t know what I should have learned from it.
I got a job and started saving at age 23. At the bottom of the housing crisis in 1993, we bought our first home with all our savings and a bank loan. I kept loan repayments to a minimum and managed to save from my salary into stocks: Nokia, Sonera, TJ-group. I sold them just before the dot-com bubble burst in 1999, because we needed to buy a bigger apartment for the family. From my income as a successful entrepreneur, I put all extra money into stock market shares until in 2007 we had to build an even bigger apartment for the family.
At the start of the financial crisis, I didn’t own a single stock. At the bottom of the financial crisis in early 2009, I already had small savings and some construction loan left. All-in, I bought Ford stock at $1–$2. My view was that Ford would endure and GM would fail. That’s what happened, and a year later I sold the Fords at around 400% profit. More would have been available, too. The profits came too easily. I thought I was a good investor.
Thus, I avoided the bursting of the dot-com bubble and the financial crisis purely by luck due to my real estate projects.
I took a break from active investing in 2010–2018 due to busy family years. Mostly I studied and practiced trading a bit with futures and currencies. I owned Revenio, among others, which I let go of eight years too early. I joined the forum in 2018, and investing as a future main livelihood started tempting me more and more. This dream is yet to be realized.
At the beginning of the corona pandemic, I sold heavily and managed to time my purchases at the bottom. At the end of March 2020, I was all-in again. That was probably good luck again, but I did have a clear view that the recovery would be J-shaped. I refused to believe in the tech downturn that began in 2021. That is relatively and absolutely my biggest investment mistake so far.
7. What does your portfolio consist of? What are your three latest acquisitions and why have you added them to your portfolio?
I manage my company’s, my personal, my family’s, and one other portfolio. The portfolios contain over 50 companies from Finland, the United States, Sweden, Norway, and Canada. In the United States, Sweden, and Norway, I invest exclusively in tech; in Canada, in mining companies. In Finland, the main focus is on small growth companies followed by Inderes.
I have bought the following stocks over the past month:
Embracer. The market’s belief in the company is gone. However, the company has 14,000 employees, of which 10,000 are game developers. This is a valuable asset whose potential the short-sighted market fails to look far enough ahead.
Intel. A turnaround company. The 2.5-year downtrend of the stock price has ended. The construction of new production lines in Germany and the US improves the company’s competitiveness. Talk of Nvidia as a future customer and the AI hype are increasing demand for the stock at least in the coming months. In an uptrend on a weekly basis.Paypal. I bought at the peaks of the overheated market in 2021. The company’s sales are projected to continue 15% annual growth, and valuation multiples are excellent for a growth company. Technically, the price bottom is possibly behind us. In an uptrend on a daily basis. I plan to increase my position in a couple more tranches.
8. What does your step-by-step stock picking process look like?
If I don’t know the company yet, I get a superficial look at its business from the company’s own website and equity research, if available. I usually buy the first tranche even before a thorough introduction. I can’t be bothered to research unless I have a small position.
I currently check valuation levels with key figures on Koyfin. Usually, there are also forecasts for a few years ahead.
I always time my purchase using technical analysis. The stock is sold if technical analysis shows that market momentum has turned. I don’t want to keep owning a good company that the market rejects. This is difficult. I hope to learn soon.
9. What is the biggest success of your investing career and what factors led to this success?
Difficult question. I don’t have information on hand for all my sales. I would like to measure success by the share of capital gains in the portfolio’s value. In that sense, buying Ford in 2009 and selling in 2010 would be the biggest success. However, the investment was heavily gambling-like. On the other hand, this led me to study the US automotive industry and buy Tesla stock.
As an investor, my biggest success is the purchases of Qt Group in 2017 and sales in 2021. The purchases were over 10% of my portfolios, and I had the patience to hold them. The rise was eventually over 1500%. I bought because I believed in the product. I sold because I considered management compensation unacceptably generous, which in my opinion showed poor board judgment.
10. What are your two biggest strengths as an investor and what do you consider to be your biggest area for development as an investor?
My biggest strength is definitely that I have made several mistakes and learned from at least some of them. Another strength is the passion to ponder the future prospects of companies. A clear area for development is timing the right moment to sell. I have often ended up owning a stock that the market has rejected. On the other hand, I have often sold too early.
11. Analyze these three companies with 30 words per company.
-Kahoot!
A learning app that is the second most popular in the world right after Google. The company is an alternative on the OTC market (Oslo) in a gigantic market that reshaped due to the corona pandemic. The market didn’t like the slowing growth. However, it has grown almost in line with management’s promises for three years. I own shares.
-Remedy
Finland’s only listed gaming company, whose valuation is unfortunately difficult to estimate. It is a high-risk investment. The market does not believe in the success of all five simultaneous game projects. The next game, Alan Wake II, will be released in October in less than four months. A flop would collapse the stock price. Forecasting is harder than normal. I own shares.
-Tecnotree
A Finnish software developer that makes ERP systems for telecom operators. Of its 884 employees, 654 are in India. It is the cheapest company on the Helsinki Stock Exchange based on earnings multiples. The market fears that its revenue will not fully reach the cash register. Management has increased its ownership through stock rewards and direct purchases. I own shares.
12. What are your four most important valuation multiples and why?
EV/EBIT and EV/EBITDA. Some earnings-based valuation multiple is a must even for growth companies. The latter if earnings are still negative.
EV/S and EBIT% + growth%. With these combined, I can position the company in a comparable valuation field with other growth companies.
ROIC. The company must generate added value, meaning ROIC must be higher than WACC.
OCF/EV. Operating cash flow yield. Even for a growth company, this should improve annually.
13. What do you get from the Inderes Forum that you can’t get anywhere else?
From the forum, I constantly get new ideas and dissenting views on companies. They help challenge my own wrong views.
14. Analyze these guys:
What these gentlemen have in common is a polite and friendly style. Model members.
@jaska7, a hard worker at digging up information for the forum, especially about green tech companies. I still read the posts, even though I don’t really have green tech in my portfolio right now.
@JHeiskanen, an excellent writer at the beginning of his investing career, the driving force of the Rush Factory thread.
@Lexus, a versatile investment professional, a valuable member for the rest of us forum members.
@Roni_Peuranheimo, a rising analyst star who takes the time to answer all my Tecnotree questions. In a challenging role, as Tecnotree’s management comes from a different culture.
15. You have spent a huge amount of time on the Forum and thus know us forum members well. Can you name a typical mistake made by forum members that we could learn to avoid?
I have learned that no one’s purchases should be followed. The three biggest losses in my portfolio have occurred over the last four years by buying in the footsteps of a well-known forum member. I will never do it again. Do not follow me, even if I announce my purchases or sales. Those announcements are just for my own mental maintenance.
16. Investment psychology is far too underrated as an area of investing. Do you practice investment psychology in any way, and if so, how?
Yes, in two ways. I have learned to control my emotions when stock prices fall and rise. The decrease in the value of the portfolio no longer causes me grief. Mistakes must be remembered, but lost money must not.
Secondly, stock prices are market psychology. Technical analysis is my tool to signal and anticipate the degree of market greed and fear. I have practiced this for over 40 years.17. What would today’s MoneyWalker say to the MoneyWalker of the past who had just started investing?
Get to know the company and its forecasted future before you buy the stock. The same applies especially when selling.
18. What goals do you have for investing? Do you have goals in terms of euros?
My goal is to beat the S&P 500 index on an annual basis, which means I want to beat my wife’s investment portfolio. I no longer have a specific euro-denominated goal.
19. Could you give a tip on how Alokas could learn to analyze companies more independently?
First of all, I would separate the analysis of the company from the analysis of the stock price. In company analysis, the company’s own website is the primary source of information, but I also recommend using analysis services. For example, Koyfin and Tikr are well worth their price.
Stock price analysis does not receive the credit it deserves in investment literature. It makes no sense to buy even an undervalued company whose price turns downward when the market rejects it. You have to have the patience to wait for a turnaround in sentiment. That is why I would learn the basics of technical analysis.
20. What would you especially like to thank the forum members for?
Thank you for all the company threads and the analyses you write in them. They are an irreplaceable help when trying to figure out what you think about companies as investment targets. Such a knowledge bank cannot be obtained from anywhere else.
Thanks to MW for the high-quality answers!
I am truly happy with my interview series and especially with these excellent answers from the interviewees. I sincerely hope that many forum members and other investors as well would read these thoughtfully, because you can definitely get a lot of help for your own investment activities from them, as long as you are open-minded and read the answers with thought.
I want to thank MoneyWalkker for their contribution to our high-quality Forum. It’s pretty cool that there are various investors hanging out here who share information and help other investors - that’s perhaps the best thing about this Forum.
Have a great weekend! 