Stockpicks fail. Strategies persist. Learn how to build and test YOUR portfolio.
Rational Compounder is a research platform for serious private investors — compounding frameworks, institutional-grade research, and tools that show you what your portfolio is actually doing.
How the site is organised
Constitution
The Investor Constitution
Seven rules written on a calm day so they can be followed on a bad one. Actionable constraints for investors who already know the theory.
Rule 4: Define a maximum cash allocation as a percentage of net worth. Anything above it deploys on a fixed schedule, not a market call.
Research
Strategies & Research
Private markets, factor investing, macro regimes, currency risk. Each piece takes a position, states the assumptions, and names the conditions under which it would be wrong.
From “What Private Debt Actually Returns”: the typical fund's cost structure removes 200–350 basis points from gross returns before you see a number.
PortSmith Tool
PortSmith
A portfolio analysis tool that tells you not what your portfolio returned — but why. Return attribution, risk decomposition, rebalancing and cashflow modelling.
Who this is for
- Who this is for
- Private investors managing meaningful capital themselves — people who already know the difference between a factor tilt and a sector bet, and want net-of-cost analysis rather than an introduction to diversification.
- What this is not
- Not personalised financial advice, not a stock-tip service, and not a place where products are sold to you. No affiliate links, no sponsored content. You make your own decisions; the research gives you the framework and the numbers behind it.
- What happens after the trial
- Pricing is not yet fixed. Founder members keep access free through the trial period, and no card is held — so there are no surprise charges. When paid plans start you will be told in advance and can simply stop.
One piece of research, every Sunday.
Membership is by application. Approved members receive weekly research, the full library and the complete PortSmith feature set. No password, no social login.
Free during the trial period — no card required.
~10 min read, every Sunday.
Written by a CFA and CAIA charterholder with 17 years across private equity, private debt, and family office portfolio management. More about the author
Latest writing
Principles
Ray Dalio
Ray Dalio's life and work principles, and the 5-step process behind them
The legendary hedge fund investor shares his principles for achieving success in any walk of life. A well structured book that is both a captivating read and a workbook to return to on an ongoing basis.
The Changing World Order
Ray Dalio
500 years of history, six stages, and where the cycle stands now
Ray Dalio looks back 500 years to show that everything evolves in cycles, and how world power has shifted from the Dutch to the British to the Americans, and now toward China.
The Little Book That (Still) Beats The Market
Joel Greenblatt
The magic formula: above-average businesses at below-average prices
A simple guide to value investing based on fundamental analysis, facilitated by Joel Greenblatt's magic formula. How to buy above-average businesses at below-average prices, consistently.
Adaptive Markets
Andrew Lo
Markets as an evolving ecosystem rather than an efficient equilibrium
How financial markets evolve through selection of the fittest, and how to survive and prosper in that changing environment. Andrew Lo challenges the efficient markets hypothesis.
Billion Dollar Whale
Tom Wright and Bradley Hope
How Jho Low moved USD 4.6bn out of 1MDB
The story of a man who fooled Wall Street, Hollywood and the world, and what the 1MDB scandal reveals about the plumbing of global finance.