The 15% Rule Portfolio

The 15% Rule Portfolio was inspired by a Substack article I wrote while thinking about how I would grow a portfolio again from $50K to $1M+. I spent a long time considering how that journey could have been smoother and more predictable, with fewer poor outcomes—while still taking enough risk to achieve a generational leap in wealth.

You can read the full article for a deeper explanation of the framework. The core idea, however, is simple: you should never permanently risk more than 15% of your capital. In this portfolio, that 15% is allocated to options positions. These trades are structured so that they may go to zero if the timing is wrong, but when the outcome is favorable they aim to return roughly 3× the capital invested.

The full article walks through the portfolio theory in detail. In short, a Monte Carlo simulation of this strategy produced the following results over the portfolio's lifetime:

• Worst-case simulation: $65,596
• Median outcome: $7,937,850
• Mean outcome: $14,427,072

These are obviously very wild outcomes starting from an initial value of $50,000. Achieving them requires successful—and somewhat repeatable—options execution, which is exactly what this portfolio is designed to test.

We'll be testing that theory here.

As always, this is not investment advice. This project is for entertainment purposes only. Alphy and I hope you enjoy following along.