Reflections on the 4th Annual eToro Popular Investor Summit in Cyprus

Many of you have already seen social media content or posts in the feed from other Popular Investors who flew out to Cyprus for the 4th annual eToro Popular Investor summit. I’m here to add to those posts and share my thoughts after a few days back home from the event.

Insights from the OGs

Perhaps I’m getting old, but I particularly enjoy talking to the OG popular investors who’ve been doing this for as long as I have. Speaking with Jeppe Kirk Bonde is always insightful. His enthusiasm in person is infectious. He and @MrG23 both participated in the Shark Tank event, where a selection of popular investors pitched their portfolios for sharks to consider investing in. Unsurprisingly, they both were selected by several panelists.

I didn’t get as much time to talk to Heloise Grieff or Mariano Pardo this time. Heloise briefly discussed her exploration of quant trading strategies. This topic intrigued me enough to attend a presentation about it the following day.

Friendly Faces and New Connections

I didn't just hang out with the long-term PI crew. I spent time talking to a wide range of PIs and eToro staff across the three-day event. At the last eToro PI summit, I made friends with Catalina Valderrama. She’s the life of the party, always engaging with someone. She is one of the best examples on social media for consistent short-form content—someone I could really learn a lot from.

Steven Budgen is another bold character. Although he’s more known for crypto, he has spoken to a very broad range of investors with different methodologies and themes. He can discuss REITs, precious metals, tech stocks, and everything in between. He and Zech Bin Zheng invited me for a meal in Limassol after the event ended, where we also found Robert MERC. I have huge respect for all of these guys and have recommended people check out their profiles for several years now.

I was thrilled to talk to several diamond clients during the event. They shared insights and experiences from the industries they work in. It was reassuring to hear the thoughts of one client who works in cybersecurity. Their views aligned with mine on the impact AI is likely to have over the coming years, especially concerning more impersonation-based scams on the horizon.

It was great seeing all the eToro staff I interact with online. Sam Rudnick, who leads the PI program at eToro, has been there from the start. During one of his presentations, he showed on-screen the original email he sent me almost exactly ten years ago, inviting me to become a popular investor. The email went into my spam folder, and it took a few more communications before I eventually joined the PI program.

I also spoke with Tal, Filipe, and others from the product team. We discussed new feature ideas and where I think eToro can continue improving. Filipe created a fun side game at the event. It listed around 20 different stocks and challenged players to select just five to invest in one year ago to generate the best YTD return. I'm proud to report I was among the top 10 for European stocks (day 2) and the top 20 for US (day 1).

The final shoutout is for Amy, who heads up PR at eToro. She and I have worked together from the very start. She gave a compelling speech near the end of the summit about how important it is to tell our stories. She helped get me featured on Bloomberg, the BBC, and much more as I was building my profile on eToro.

The Role of Content in Today's Market

Ironically, a reasonable amount of the content at the event focused on content itself. Nas Daily, a big social media influencer, was involved in a few sessions. He discussed utilizing AI for content creation. AI was a theme visible throughout the event, with interesting PI-built AI tools by @CPHequities and others highlighted. What was particularly interesting is that all of the tools showcased were built using Base44—programming via AI prompting. When combined with eToro’s new APIs, this could result in some extremely powerful user-generated tools for screening stocks, analysis, and news aggregation.

Something I was extremely happy to see was the announcement from Yoni of “Pro Investors.” This initiative separates PIs who have undertaken qualifications in investing from the rest of the Popular Investor Programme.

Closing Thoughts

This time, I’m determined to keep it short, so I’ll end it there for this post. As usual, thanks for reading, following, and copying me. I’ll have a monthly update out in a few days reviewing last month’s activity. I’m also working on my quarterly update for Q3 2025. Stay tuned!