Preface

The ETF assets in US have grown at a 34% annualized since 2000, bringing the current total to $3.4 trillion, according to James Ross, Chairman of the Global SPDR Business in State Street Global Advisors. Without a doubt such numbers indicate high popularity of ETFs among the investors. But what made this type of investments so attractive? And what stands behind the term “ETF”? Let’s start our journey from the beginning of ETF history and consider the SPDR S&P500 ETF, one of the largest ETFs in terms of AuM, in its context.
ETF Begins

The idea of index investing appeared more than 30 years ago. At that time only trusts and closed end funds tried to provide the investors with the opportunity to get exposure to one class of assets. According to “The Exchange-Traded Funds Manual” written by Gary Gastineau, the first kind of ETF was Index Participation Shares for the S&P 500 launched in 1989. However, the Federal Court of Chicago decided that the fund worked like future contracts and so should be traded on the futures exchange.

The date of establishment of the ETF vehicles is considered to be January 22, 1993 when State Street Global Advisors created SPDR S&P 500 ETF. It was the very first ETF, becoming the flagship for the exchange traded products and meaningfully impacted the modern investment landscape.
SPDR S&P500 ETF

The SPDR S&P500 ETF was designed to track the performance of the US large cap market equities included in S&P 500 index. So the purchase of shares of this ETF provides investors with the access to the US large cap space and also with the investment results corresponding to the price and yield of the S&P500 index. Let’s take a closer look at the underlying index.

Standard and Poor’s 500 (S&P 500®) is an American stock market index based on the market capitalization of 500 large companies having common stock listed on NYSE and NASDAQ. Created in 1957 the S&P 500 index was the first US market-cap-weighted stock index. One of the major characteristics which makes each index unique is its proprietary components selection model. The companies included in the S&P 500 are selected by the S&P Index Committee, a team of analysts and economists at Standard & Poor’s.

S&P designed several criteria for including the company in the index:

Universe. All constituents must be U.S. companies.
Eligibility Market Cap. Companies with market cap of USD 6.1 bn or greater.
Public Float. At least 50% of shares outstanding must be available for trading.
Financial Viability. Companies must have positive as-reported earnings over the most recent quarter, as well as over the most recent four quarters (summed together).
Adequate Liquidity and Reasonable Price. Consists of highly tradable common stocks, with active and deep markets.

The components of the index are reviewed quarterly in order to remain indicative of the US stock market (well, I even believe when the new company is included in the index, its management celebrates this event).

Thanks to its companies selection methodology, today S&P 500 index covers appr. 80% of available market capitalization and so is considered as one of the best representations of the US stock market.

Let’s return back to the SPDR S&P 500 ETF. This ETF holds the portfolio of common stocks that are included in the S&P 500 index, with the weight of each stock in the portfolio substantially corresponding to the weight of such stock in the S&P 500 index.



And what about investment returns?

The value of each unit in SPDR S&P500 ETF at any given time reflects the movement of the underlying index. So the objective of this fund is to generate the investment results corresponding to the returns of the index composed of the US 500 large cap market equities. As of March 23, 2018 returns were solid over the 1-Y, 3-Y and 5-Y period, with gains of 17.11%, 11.08% and 14.65%, respectively.



New horizons for the conventional vehicles

SPDR S&P 500 ETF is the best recognised and the oldest ETF which typically tops rankings for the largest asset under management and greatest trading volume. To sum it all up, the key benefits of SPDR S&P 500 ETF are:

Closely tracks the performance of the S&P 500 index;
The oldest of the S&P 500 benchmarked fund;
Ability to get a depth of the market exposure;
Provides an opportunity to diversify the portfolio;
Can be used as a hedging instrument;
Highly liquid.

Thanks to the success of SPDR S&P500 ETF derived from its key advantages, today the number and variety of ETFs allow its investors to get exposure to nearly each market asset class.

How do crypto investors may get exposure to such a popular instrument as ETF among traditional investors? The Blackmoon Platform provides a unique opportunity for a blockchain investor to access the performance of a liquid, conventional and diversified instrument as an ETF, gaining exposure to the US large cap space without leaving the Blockchain ecosystem. You may find more information regarding the SPDR S&P500 ETF and Blackmoon Platform here.

Prepared by Anastasia Rodina

platform website: https://blackmoonplatform.com;
telegram chat for the investors in asset tokens https://t.me/blackmoonplatform;
telegram chat for the BMC token holders https://t.me/blackmooncrypto.


Disclaimer: This article provides you with educational material only and was prepared by Blackmoon team for information purposes only. Cryptocurrency markets are unregulated and carry a high degree of risk, including risk of loss of entire investment. Only risk capital you can afford to lose. This post is not intended to be investment advice. Before deciding to invest, you should seek independent legal and professional advice.

“95% of all traders fail” is a widely known statistic and at the same time a forgotten facet of traditional trading. This has been a long-standing problem. Many individuals, instead of actively trading, choose to index the market or turn to algorithmic trading.

But how does this number look like in the realm of crypto trading? While there are many factors contributing to this fail rate, commonly lack of professionalism or psychology, the specificity of the crypto universe takes it to the whole new level.

In this article we review fundamental problems in crypto trading and propose solutions when the game is rigged.

POSITIVE OUTLOOK

You may say that nowadays the crypto market is highly inefficient, offers many opportunities and endlessly appealing for the sharks and whales hungry for the big scoops and tasty tidbits in the faces of average crypto traders. And you will be right. However, not only understanding of your position in this food chain matters, but also the economic viability of the time and energy spent on beating the market.

THE CHALLENGE

Let us now switch to the obstacles that, in our case, can turn 95 percent into 99. We will break it down into 4 categories each representing major headaches of the crypto traders:

Crypto trading peculiarities

Absence of trading sessions, or 24/7 trading, causes substantial inconvenience to everyone. Certain individuals are taking shifts with their teammates, while the others are setting price alerts that will wake them at midnight to take the necessary action. We plotted hourly data of Bitcoin trading volumes to show you that there is no constant periodicity and the volume explosions may occur at any time throughout the day and night.



Security and technical complexity

Have you ever heard this story about some random guy losing a significant amount of bitcoins along with his old hard drive? We can only imagine the number of digital coins buried under piles of iron. !ombined with the stolen funds during the cybercrime activities and the coins that were lost because of an error in the recipient address, it sums up to real money

On top of that, crypto trading tools, including trading terminals and exchanges, are far behind their counterparts from the traditional world. Today, on Coinmarketcap we have a list of 219 exchanges, and if you choose one, you do it at your own risk.

Lack of transparency of the crypto-related projects

Oh, dear reader, you have, probably, many times been faced with this problem when you spend about 30 minutes on yet another “disrupting the industry” company’s website and you have no clue regarding what they actually do and is there a working product or not. That is why even the most patient and deliberate investor may be subjected to the irregularity of the industry.

Market manipulations

At a certain stage of development every crypto trader was in a pump & dump group chat. However, it is only a drop in the ocean as main actors on the stage are “whales” who time after time taking an advantage of less-knowledgeable investors by drawing whatever price movement they want. The chart below shows how the price manipulation has sharply risen the interest in the public, and we all know the end of this story.



SO THE GAME IS RIGGED, SHOULD I QUIT?

Not really. Some companies rose to this challenge and the Blackmoon Platform already has solutions for different types of traders
—
Crypto Strategies powered by algorithmic trading. The strategies are deliberately prepared by our Data Science team and are fully automated.

Let us walk you through the major types of traders and existing solutions:
“HODLERS” and Position Traders

These individuals do believe in the bright future of the blockchain, hold their coins from months to years and do not depend much on potentially misleading news and temporal price swings.

Solution: Blackmoon’s Top 20 Market Cap Crypto Strategy

The strategy lets you get the market exposure by buying just one token which is the asset token of the strategy tracking coins with the largest market capitalization in the previous three-month period. The core objective of the strategy is to generate the returns corresponding to the yield of the cryptocurrencies with the largest capitalization.

In just three weeks, the strategy has already shown solid performance in USD (+14.5%) and continues to outperform the market yielding a remarkable return of 31.4% in ETH and 3.7% in BTC!



Day Traders and Action Chasers

If you hold your coins no longer than day or two and you are obsessed by huge price movements, possibly, you belong to this category.

Solution: Blackmoon’s One Day Most Volatile Crypto Strategy

One Day Most Volatile Strategy token is the asset token of the strategy tracking the cryptocurrencies that have had the largest volatility in the previous 24 hours. The objective of this strategy is to generate the returns corresponding to the yield of the crypto assets with the largest volatility.

In just three weeks, outstanding results of this strategy are marked the +30.9% return in USD and yielding stunning returns in ETH(+50.2%) and BTC(+18.5%)!



Swing or Trend Traders

These individuals open their positions, sometimes gradually, at what they calculate to be the local bottom, then they hold the position all the way to what they believe to be the local top, most of the times gradually scaling out of the position to lock in profits. Swing trading is generally done over the course of days or weeks.

Solution: Blackmoon’s Daily Delta Rebalancing Crypto Strategy

Daily Delta Rebalancing token is the asset token of the strategy focusing on delivering alpha to ETH by adjusting the basket of the top 6 market-cap of coins and cash. The core objective of the strategy is to generate the returns corresponding to the yield of the top 6 cryptocurrencies with the largest capitalization providing downside risk protection by dynamically allocating portfolio between cash and crypto.

While the strategy currently falls behind the other two, it left the “red zone” and shows what it was created for by outperforming ETH even when the market plummets.


For more information: https://blackmoonplatform.com/showcase/ddr/aboutase/ddr/about

CONCLUSION

There is a belief that selling is backward-looking and buying is forward-looking. Investors buy coins because of their expectations and sell them because of what has already happened. In most cases, this leads the majority of investors selling winners and holding losers. In addition, many retail investors do not stand up to the psychological pressure of the crypto market with all these price swings of unimaginable scale.

Machines, in turn, do not sleep, nor do they tremble before unexpected price movements. They just automatically execute the predefined algorithm and do it cost efficiently.

So is it worth trying to hit these 5% of winning traders? Or it is better to save you time, energy and nerves by using algorithmic trading and investing in fitting your goals and personality set of strategies?

You should do you own research and weigh all the pros and cons before making the decision. On our side, we will keep the pace and introduce new crypto strategies in the nearest future. Stay tuned for further updates in the investment opportunities on our platform!

Handy links to stay tuned to our updates:

website: https://blackmoonplatform.com
telegram chat: https://t.me/blackmoonplatform
info video: https://youtu.be/6Ii0XckQOAE
YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/blackmoonplatform
parent company website: https://blackmoonfg.com

DISCLAIMER

This article provides you with educational material only and was prepared by Blackmoon team for information purposes only. Cryptocurrency markets are unregulated and carry a high degree of risk, including a risk of loss of entire investment. Only risk capital you can afford to lose.

Past performance does not guarantee future results. Trading history presented is less than 5 years and may not suffice as basis for investment decision. This post is not intended to be investment advice. Before deciding to invest, you should seek independent legal and professional advice.

Prime Meridian Real Estate Lending fund. Blackmoon offers access to US high yield marketplace lending fund.

Building on the recent successful launch of their three crypto strategies that outperform major cryptocurrencies, Blackmoon now offers a tokenized version of a leading US hedge fund.

Prime Meridian Capital Management is an SEC-registered investment advisor founded in 2012 with $700 million in assets under management. It was named “Top Fund Manager” at LendIt USA Awards 2017 and ranked #554 by Inc. Magazine on its annual Inc. 5000 the same year.

The BMxPMR token offered on the platform gives exposure to the performance of the Prime Meridian Real Estate Lending fund. This fund is the fastest growing across four funds established by Prime Meridian Capital Management. Its assets under management grew more than 100 times since inception in 2016. And every month the fund has delivered positive returns to the investors.

The fund invests in a $2.0 trillion private real estate lending market. The portfolio consists of the short duration, high-yield loans secured by the US real estate. The loans are issued by the leading US loan origination platforms. These platforms apply rigorous scoring and checks to its clients.

To provide investors with additional security and to enhance returns Prime Meridian Capital Management applies its own scoring. The automated algorithm selects loans with the best expected risk and return profile. This approach helps Prime Meridian to consistently outperform peers and win prestigious rewards like “Top Fund Manager” at LendIt USA.

Have you ever wanted to invest in the real estate lending market but didn’t have 100,000’s of dollars to do so? With a low minimum investment, you can invest in a secure real estate fund in just a few clicks on the Blackmoon platform. BMxPMR token gives you access to the performance of the successfully implemented investment strategy, professionally managed by one of the most experienced teams in the industry.

Detailed information is available exclusively to the verified users of the platform. Complete your KYC now to get access to this and other opportunities on Blackmoon.

Handy links to stay tuned to our updates:

website: https://blackmoonplatform.com
telegram chat: https://t.me/blackmoonplatform
info video: https://youtu.be/6Ii0XckQOAE

DISCLAIMER

Investment in cryptocurrencies carries high degree of risk and volatility and is not suitable for every investor; therefore, you should not risk the capital you cannot afford to lose. Please consult an independent professional financial or legal advisor to ensure the product meets your objectives before you decide to invest. Regional restrictions and suitability checks apply.