When Yoni Asia sat down with Warren Buffett for a charity dinner in January 2020, he was hoping to convert the legendary investor from a crypto skeptic to a Bitcoin believer.
Instead, the CEO and co-founder of eToro, a social trading and multi-asset investing platform, left the table with a new appreciation for Buffett’s stock trading, or value investing.
In a recent interview with Business Insider, Asia reflected on the lessons he learned from that meal and why he thinks even Buffett-style investors should take advantage of artificial intelligence.
Asia said meeting Buffett, who recently retired after 60 years as Berkshire Hathaway’s CEO, was a “great moment.”
After hearing “The Oracle of Omaha,” Assia realized that he had been doing the right thing as an investor. It was about finding bargains, staying within your circle of competence, and identifying companies with durable competitive advantages.
Hearing Mr. Buffett talk about educating people was another aha moment for Asia. This taught eToro users about the market and helped them realize the value of their own efforts to build wealth.
Assia said the conversation helped him fully understand the magic of compound interest, or how quickly money grows over time. For example, if you invest $1,000 and earn a modest 5% return each year, your money will double in 15 years and 10x within 50 years.
After cutting ties with Buffett, Asia devoured books like “The Smart Investor,” hired value investing consultants, and instructed eToro employees to do deep research and spread the gospel of long-term ownership.
He said that after six years, eToro has a “significant amount” of value investors producing analysis, blogs and other research about the companies in which they invest.
But Assia said that shortly after dining with Buffett, he met the family of Bernard Arnault, the CEO of LVMH, who had amassed a fortune similar to Buffett’s investing in luxury fashion brands.
He also named Steve Cohen, CEO of Point72, and the late Jim Simmons, founder of Renaissance Technologies, who became a billionaire by aggressively trading the market.
Assia said it has become clear that there is no one way to invest successfully and people need to choose the approach that works for them.
He said eToro allows users to do that by allowing them to learn from each other and copy their colleagues’ portfolios if they choose to share.
“Everyone has the right to receive quants”
eToro has rolled out several user-created AI-powered applications in preparation for launching an app store-like marketplace for these types of tools.
One tool allows users to discuss their portfolios with AI versions of investment “giants” such as Buffett and Peter Lynch, helping investors of all types refine their approach.
Another tool collects information such as when users are most productive during the day and helps them fine-tune their strategies to play to their strengths.
The third offers a virtual investment board. AI agents that specialize in topics like geopolitics and risk management send daily reports to the chief investment officer’s AI model, who then shares portfolio-specific insights with users.
Whether you’re a Buffett-style investor looking for undervalued gems or a momentum trader looking to significantly increase your profits, “everyone has the right to quantitative investing,” Asia said.
He added that AI will give individual investors “the right tools and the right community” to put them on par with “the most sophisticated quantitative hedge funds in the world.”
Assia said he has personally embraced AI, using OpenClaw, an open source AI assistant, to build about 30 different apps in the past month.
When asked what young people who are worried about AI will eliminate their jobs can do, Assia recommended acquiring AI skills.
“AI is going to completely reshape everything in the labor market, so people definitely need to work with it,” he said.
Asia said the limitless possibilities of AI remind him of the possibilities of the internet in the mid-1990s, and more recently the early days of cryptocurrencies and blockchain.
Although Buffett has had little to do with the AI boom, Assia said he is following Buffett’s lead in educating people about finance, giving them access to markets, and encouraging them to build both knowledge and wealth over time.
