Aldo Tobler's Blog

Valpolicella Wine Trip

We decided to visit "valley of many cellars" for this year's wine tasting trip which is probably most famous for its Amarone wines. But the region has so much more to offer in terms of wine, food and its proximity to the city of Verona. Besides being famous for being

Systematic Approach to Tasting Wine

I've recently attended the WSET basic wine course, which I wholeheartedly recommend to anyone. I was a little bit skeptical going in because I thought it would just be repeating what I learned from Wine Folly and the various winery visits. But the course turned out to be very informative,

Portfolio Allocation

A colleague at work once showed a website called Novel Investor which greatly shows market performances. Ever since, I've frequently visited this site when reviewing my portfolio allocation. To keep things simple, I invest only in mutual funds or ETFs instead of individual stocks. But to satisfy my speculative urge,

Book: How to Win Friends & Influence People

This book by Dale Carnegie is on many recommendation lists, but I never picked it up until this year because I felt that the title is rather obnoxious. But I finally relented to find out why rave reviews are all about. And the book was originally published in 1936, so

YouTube: The Fall of a Superstar Psychologist

The YouTube algorithm once again suggested another great video from the channel quant. The controversy surrounding Dan Ariely and his studies is still ongoing and has since been covered in other videos and podcasts, but this video is the first time I heard about it. The controversy caught me by

Personal Finance

Taxation of Pension Lump-Sum Payout

Coming towards the end of the year, one way to lower your upcoming tax bill is to make voluntary purchases into your pension accounts. These are the pension pillars where you can make such purchases: Pillar 2 This is the mandatory pension account setup by your employer. When you receive

Self Improvement

Microsoft Azure Administrator Certification

A couple of months ago, I sat for the Microsoft Azure Administrator exam and fortunately passed it. That was the first exam I did after graduating from university, so preparing for it brought back old memories. And perhaps for that reason, I didn't prepare for the exam in the best

Best Coffee in Zurich

Like many others in Zurich, I welcome the emergence of the specialty coffee scene in Zurich. This is especially true since you can easily spend a lot of money on bad coffee around Zurich's city centre. Although my favourite place to drink coffee is at home on my couch, I

YouTube: The man who almost faked his way to a Nobel Prize

Once in a while, the YouTube algorithm would suggest an awesome video, and this is one of these times. The series about Jan Hendrik Schön from BobbyBroccoli is just awesome. The amount of research and work put into these videos are just mind-boggling. And the data visualisation used here is

Personal Finance

Comparing ETFs

Investing in ETFs is an effortless way to achieve a high degree of diversification. Most ETFs are passively-managed and follow a certain index, meaning that they aim to achieve the same performance as that index. Therefore, it's not uncommon to choose the index first when looking to invest in an

House Plants

Owning and caring for plants is a newfound hobby that only started a few years ago. I never really cared for plants before, but can't really imagine living without them now. However, it's really been a learning experience with its ups and downs (killing your first plant could be quite

Personal Finance

The Opportunity Cost of Mortgage Amortization

In the process of a property purchase, the topic of amortization will come up sooner or later. This jargony term basically means the process of repaying a mortgage debt. But to understand this, it would help to look at how a mortgage is usually structured. Typically, the financing of a

Personal Finance

Third Pillar and the Power of Compounding Interest

If you have a 3A account, you might be familiar with the concept of staggered payouts. This is where 3A accounts are liquidated one-by-one each year starting with the fifth year prior to retirement. Since assets from liquidated 3A accounts are counted as income, staggered payouts allow you to save

Personal Finance

Third Pillar

The question whether to open a third-pillar (3A) account came soon after I started working full-time. But the number of available options made this seemingly simple decision quite intimidating. And I must admit that I made mistakes along the way until I found the optimal solution for myself. But in

Personal Finance

Tax Deadlines in Switzerland

While I was a student and not having very much income, I must admit that I didn't really care about the details of the Swiss tax system. I just paid whenever the bills arrive, and never gave it too much thought. But then I graduated, started a full-time job and