eToro Copy Trade Performance During COVID-19 Pandemic

It has been 4 months since China alerted WHO of an unusual pneumonia in Wuhan. Today, COVID-19 has infected more than 1.2 million people in 207 countries with 69,000 people succumbing to the virus according to WHO. A truly devastating story to tell to the next generation.

This virus has ravaged countries and collapsed economies worldwide. America alone reported 6.6 million people applying for unemployment by the end of March 2020. According to IMF, the COVID-19 will cause a global recession that is ‘way worse’ than the 2008 global financial crisis calling it “humanity’s darkest hour.” (Source: Economic Times). The International Labour Organization said in a March 18 preliminary assessment that global unemployment could reach 25 million with millions more underemployed (Source: International Labour Organization). This number is beginning to be a gross underestimation of the potential damage today.

In terms of expected GDP, Germany expects contraction to -2.8%, France -1%, Italy -3% (Source: Xinhua). In Asia, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) expects regional growth to fall to 2.2% from the initial forecast of 5.5% last September 2019. It expects a rebound to 6.2% by 2021 (Source: ADB).

According to Prof. Nuno Fernandes of IESE Business School in Barcelona Spain, what we are experiencing now is not like any other. COVID-19 is a truly global crisis, unlike the 2008 financial crisis where it started in the US and spilled over to other parts of the world, or the SARS crisis of 2003, or even the 1997 Asian financial crisis. COVID-19 also struck in a time when we already have very low-interest rates in many counties around the world. This gives central banks fewer ammunitions to help a country in times of need. In the previous SARS crisis, China only contributes 2-3% to the world GDP, today its 18-20%.

Industries are being shattered every day including tourism, hospitality, airline, transport and shipping, construction, food, manufacturing, electronics, personal, even agriculture, and entertainment industry are all negatively affected. Some industries that may have slightly less negative effects are healthcare, pharmaceutical, energy, and telecommunications.

In terms of stock market performance this 2020, Japan saw more than a 25% decline, similar to the US, Portugal, and Netherlands, while more than a 30% decline for Germany, Spain, and UK.

Major events are canceled or postponed such as Wimbledon, NBA, 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Cannes International Film Festival, and countless film, music and sporting events around the world. Heck, even Jonas Brothers’ canceled their eight performance residency in Las Vegas (if you even care). These events also contribute to the economy.

The rich and famous were not able to escape the effects of this virus. COVID-19 infected Boris Johnson, Sophie Grégoire Trudeau, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, Rudy Gobert, Kevin Durant, Prince Albert of Monaco, Prince Charles, among many others (Source: Glamour).

Top Trader Performance

If you check social media groups about investments, you will see a countless number of people sobbing over their bleeding portfolio from stocks to forex and even mutual funds.

Let’s look at the top traders in eToro and compare their performance in the past few months (in no particular order – pinch to zoom).

Check out our eToro Social Trading introduction here.

OlivierDanvel and jaynemesis did a conservative 0.52% and 1.19% respectively from February to April 6, 2020. misterg23 and harshsmith did more than 15% during this highly volatile time. The rest have negative performance. With eToro Copy Trading you can earn both when the markets are up or down.

Whoever maintains a positive performance amid these very challenging times are the ones you can really trust your money with.

eToro Copy Trading is an alternative investment. I lost money with mutual funds which are supposed to be “professionally managed”. Some traders above maintained a positive performance even during this time of crisis and this cemented my belief in the eToro system. I copy trade OlivierDanvel who never had a negative month since 2018. I repeat, not a single negative month – let that sink in. I am considering adding harshsmith and misterg23 to my portfolio. eToro Copy Trading will not get you rich but it’s a way to diversify your investment portfolio.