The story behind the Investment Time Tracker
I'm a retail investor and builder based in the UK. I've been actively investing for several years now, mostly through eToro, where I manage a portfolio across stocks, ETFs, and the occasional crypto position. You can find me on X (@HarryHH1993) where I share thoughts on investing, time management, and the tools I build.
Like a lot of people, I got into investing thinking that more research and more screen time would automatically translate into better returns. I spent hours every week reading earnings reports, watching market analysis videos, and scrolling through investing forums trying to find an edge. It felt productive. It felt like I was doing something smart with my money.
Then one day I actually sat down and calculated how much I was earning per hour from all that effort. The number was, to put it politely, not great. I was spending more time on investing than some people spend on a part-time job, and my returns weren't meaningfully better than if I'd just bought an index fund and gone for a walk.
That realization is what led me to build the Investment Time Tracker. I wanted a simple, honest way to answer a question that most investing platforms don't even acknowledge: is the time I'm spending on this actually worth it?
The tool calculates your effective hourly rate from active investing and compares it against what you'd earn passively from major benchmarks like the S&P 500, NASDAQ, gold, and Bitcoin. It's a reality check in calculator form.
My goal with this project is straightforward: help people make more intentional decisions about how they spend their investing time. Not everyone needs to go fully passive, but everyone deserves to know whether their active approach is actually paying off.
I'm not anti-active investing. I still actively manage part of my portfolio on eToro, and I enjoy the process of researching companies and understanding businesses. But I've become much more disciplined about the time I allocate to it. These days I spend about 1 to 2 hours per week on active investing decisions, and the rest of my portfolio sits in diversified index funds.
A few things I believe strongly:
I started the blog to share what I've learned about the intersection of time and investing. The posts are practical, opinionated, and based on my own experience. I write about topics like how long you should spend investing, what your hourly rate from investing really looks like, and how to track your investing time.
If any of this resonates, feel free to reach out on X. I'm always happy to chat about investing, time management, or anything in between.