About sharewise

Why does sharewise exist?

As an investor I was always annoyed at the so-called gurus who publish their half-truths in blogs and forums without anyone critically questioning the results.

The story

1. 2007

   The beginning

   For this reason I decided to become self-employed together with a partner in 2007. We were able to quickly find investors to support our plans with capital. And the first users loved the idea, we even recruited a few people from the community to work with us.

2. 2008

   The financial crisis

   In 2008 the financial crisis became a huge challenge for us, and sharewise was on the brink a few times as we were dependent on additional funding. In the end we emerged from the crisis in a better position than before as we not only secure financing but also a partnership with a leading European broker. The following years were a constant up-and-down – an experience shared by many company founders. Constantly beating the odds gave myself and the team a sense of accomplishment and taught us valuable lessons.

3. 2013

   The merger

   In 2012 we got to know a Japanese company which had started with a similar idea in Asia. Due to the clearly recognizable synergies our companies merged in 2013 – which made us very happy as the Japanese company was much larger than us and also financially healthier. This allowed us to invest a lot of time and money in a relaunch with the aim of launching a much more refined product worldwide. After presenting the new platform to many big players and financial websites we became the envy of the industry as we had redeveloped the platform from the ground up with a modern and intuitive design. We also secured great news content and financial data of the highest quality which we were able to provide to our users free of charge.

4. The relaunch nobody wanted

   The relaunch came in 2013 — and the community did not take to it. Some of the criticism was fair, seasoned users turned their backs on the site, and we never managed to turn the mood around. One user put it best at the time: “It’s the fish that has to like the bait, not the fisherman.” He was right.

The fresh start

In 2019 our Japanese partner decided to exclusively focus on its home market and wanted to shut down sharewise.com. After all these years we did not want it to end like this, a sentiment shared not only by my brother and myself but also many members of the community. So I decided to buy back the domain sharewise.com from Minkabu and develop a new version myself, investing many weekends and long nights. This time the goal was to develop an easy to use site that captures the essence of the core idea: sharewise should become a place of thoughtful exchange about stocks and the market which makes the performance of the user transparent.

The community plays a vital role in the development of the new sharewise, and the discourse has become much more relaxed and on point. The current relaunch was built together with them.