Why I Started TiltFolio
5 min read 
Why I Started TiltFolio
I have been deeply interested in investing for most of my adult life. But not in the way most financial institutions encourage. I never fully subscribed to the conventional wisdom of “buy and hold,” particularly the idea that a heavy allocation to equities is always optimal. After spending years studying financial history, I realized something that few investment professionals say out loud: buy and hold strategies can underperform for ten years or longer. During those periods, investors often lose confidence, change course at the worst time, and suffer permanent losses.
That realization set me on a long search. I wanted to build a better investment strategy, one that could survive across different economic regimes, manage risk proactively, and deliver reliable, long-term results. What started as a personal research project eventually became TiltFolio.
The Early Years: From Spreadsheets to Systems
I began as many do: by building models in Excel. I downloaded historical data for stocks, bonds, and commodities, and started testing simple rules. I wanted to understand how different asset classes behaved, and what could have helped an investor avoid major drawdowns in the past.
Spreadsheets quickly became too limited, so I began writing software to model portfolio behavior more effectively. Over time, I built increasingly complex systems, tested across different time periods and market environments. Through this process, one insight stood out: changes in volatility often came before changes in price.
This was a key breakthrough. I observed it again and again, across different assets and strategies. Volatility, more specifically, the trend in volatility, proved to be a useful leading indicator of market regime shifts. If I could incorporate that insight into a disciplined, repeatable process, it might be possible to improve both returns and risk management.
The idea remained personal until one evening, while having risotto at a friend’s house, she asked me how she should invest her savings. In that moment, I realized I had been building something far more valuable than just a personal system. What I had created for myself could help many others, especially those who wanted a thoughtful, rules-based approach to investing, without the emotional strain of guessing what the market might do next.
Why I Chose Trend-Following
After years of testing and iteration, I settled on asset class trend-following as the foundation for TiltFolio.
There were several reasons for this decision. First, I wanted to improve upon the ideas behind Bridgewater Associates’ “All Weather” strategy. Bridgewater’s core insight is correct: investors should hold a diversified mix of assets that perform well in different macroeconomic conditions. However, I believed that a dynamic allocation, guided by trend signals and regime detection, could produce better outcomes than static weights.
Second, trend-following has proven to be one of the most robust strategies in financial history. The evidence is clear across centuries of data: allocating toward assets in positive trends, and avoiding those in negative trends, improves both returns and drawdown control. It is not a trading system in the traditional sense. It is a way to systematically allocate capital across major asset classes with a long-term focus.
What TiltFolio Is
TiltFolio consists of two complementary investment systems designed to deliver consistent, risk-aware growth across market environments.
TiltFolio Adaptive is a dynamic asset allocation model that follows a two-step process. First, it determines whether markets are in a risk-on or risk-off regime by analyzing the direction of volatility. Specifically, it compares the relative performance of riskier stocks to traditionally safer ones, to infer whether volatility is expanding or contracting. This regime assessment guides the system’s overall posture. Second, TiltFolio Adaptive allocates only to asset classes that are in a confirmed uptrend. If an asset class does not meet the trend criteria, the model holds no exposure to it. While this approach helps avoid prolonged drawdowns, it may lag during rapid market reversals, an accepted trade-off for longer-term consistency and downside protection.
TiltFolio Adaptive is binary in its allocations: either 100 percent exposure to an asset class or zero. This approach simplifies execution and avoids the ambiguity of partial exposure. The portfolio rebalances monthly, providing time to react to significant shifts while avoiding overtrading.
TiltFolio Balanced is a diversified benchmark portfolio consisting of 50% intermediate-term Treasury bonds (40% IEF + 10% TLT), 30% S&P 500 stocks (SPY), and 20% gold (GLD), rebalanced annually. This strategic allocation provides consistent diversification benefits and serves as a reference point for evaluating TiltFolio Adaptive’s performance.
In practice, TiltFolio Adaptive can shift from a fully risk-on allocation to a highly defensive one, depending on the signals. Both systems are systematic, transparent, and designed to keep investors from making emotionally driven decisions during periods of market stress.
The Vision for TiltFolio
TiltFolio is currently offered as a free weekly newsletter. Each month, I publish TiltFolio Adaptive’s latest allocation and share supporting charts and commentary each week. This is the product I wished existed when I first began investing: clear, systematic, and based on evidence rather than marketing.
Looking ahead, I plan to introduce a premium version of the product. This version will combine both TiltFolio systems with additional, uncorrelated strategies and selective use of leverage. The objective is to match or exceed the performance of top hedge funds, but in a more accessible format.
In the long term, I intend to make TiltFolio available as a public investment product. This could take the form of an ETF, or potentially a tokenized version of the portfolio. Switzerland, where I currently reside, is a global leader in real-world asset tokenization. It has already evolved from being the world’s gold minting capital into a hub for digital asset infrastructure. I believe that tokenization will be a natural next step for TiltFolio, enabling broader access to a sophisticated, rules-based investment system.
Join Us
If you are looking for a more resilient way to invest, one that adapts to changing conditions and reduces the emotional strain of decision-making, I invite you to try TiltFolio.
You can sign up for the free TiltFolio Adaptive model portfolio at TiltFolio.com, and follow us on X at @TiltFolio, where I share updates, research, and portfolio charts each day.
My aim is simple: to build the best long-term investment systems in the world, and to make them accessible to anyone who wants to take a smarter approach to their financial future.
