
What is the core-satellite strategy in investing?
The core-satellite strategy is a strategy to compose your investment portfolio in a balanced way. This handy investment strategy is used by many professional investors. In this blog we would like to tell you more about it.
What does the core-satellite strategy consist of?
Using the core-satellite strategy, you put together a share portfolio based on a solid and stable investment, the ‘core’, supplemented with a number of smaller investments that carry more risk and are sometimes a less obvious choice, the ‘satellites’.
The ‘core’ is usually formed by a main investment with a broad spread. You can think of a global ETF or a fund investment with indexes. The ‘core’ generally takes up about 60 to 80% of an investment portfolio.
The ‘satellites’ are made up of alternative investments. This includes investments with a short term, speculations, options or (sustainable) investments in a certain sector, (social) subject or country.
What are the core investments?
To ensure a decent wealth in the long term, the core-satellite strategy is ideally suited. By investing in a thoughtful strategy, you ensure that there is a good and stable structure of your investment portfolio.
Here are some examples of core investments: mixed funds with shares and bonds, investments in the MSCI World Index or government bond funds. The chosen risk profile ultimately determines the right ratio between the amount of bonds and shares in the ‘core’ of your investment portfolio. It is important that your ‘core’ has a good spread in order to reduce the total risk.
What satellite investments are there?
The existence of ‘satellites’ ensures that an investor can also invest in financial products with more risk and alternative strategies can be addressed within a balanced investment portfolio. Due to the presence of a stable ‘core’, you can take more risk with your investments and therefore often make more profit.
Some good examples of satellite investments are options, sector and theme funds, turbos and financial products with short duration. By choosing riskier investments it is possible to achieve a higher return in addition to the basic returns. And that is exactly the function of the ‘satellites’: creating more space for interesting and potentially profitable investments with more risk, because you can always build on a solid foundation, the ‘core’, which generates constant returns.

What are the benefits of the core-satellite strategy?
By applying this investment strategy you can benefit from attractive advantages:
- More cost savings
- More peace in your portfolio through long-term investments
- Better returns with fewer transactions
- More distribution
How does investing according to the core-satellite method work?
Let us examine what investing according to the core-satellite method looks like in practice. We provide a profile of this type of investor. An investor who has the core-satellite method as a starting position is mainly an investor in shares, combined with at least 20% bonds. The choice for bonds refers to the defensive attitude of this category of investors, who focus on a moderately profitable capital at an acceptable risk. There is also room to invest in sustainable investments and to participate in global trends, which is an advantage for these investors. Such an investment portfolio could be constructed in the following way:
Composition ‘core’:
– 50% global and sustainable equity ETF
– 20% global bond ETF
Composition of ‘satellites’:
– 20% investment funds or ETFs of a specific subject or region
– 10% independent investments
In the most common composition of the investment portfolio based on this model, the vast majority of the investments, namely 70%, are broadly diversified and a specific approach is taken for the remaining 30%.
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