Invest €500+ & Win Big! Guaranteed Bonuses
+ A Massive Raffle →
Back to Blog

Crisis-proof Investments: How to Protect Your Capital

As the old adage goes, it takes money to make money. But if you are not safeguarding your wealth, what good is there in building it?  From rich stocks to strong bond funds and cheap ETFs, the world of finance is vast and enticing opportunists with a great spectrum of investment options.  

But there are important reasons to be cautious in your investment approach along with some shrewd means of protecting your cash and stopping loss in your investment portfolio.  Whether your business is little or you are an investor, entrepreneur, or just someone trying to protect your hard-earned money, not having a good strategy is like taking a ship out without knowing the destination.

In This Article

Conventional crisis-proof investments

When markets are unpredictable and the economy enters a downturn, certain assets consistently stand the test of time. These crisis-proof investments are known for their resilience:

  • Gold and other precious metals: the former is the symbol for stability. It always holds value to people whether or not inflation occurs or currencies lose their strength. It doesn’t accumulate income, but it preserves wealth and keeps your money safe. CBS detailed gold’s steady performance after the 2008 downturn.
  • Real estate: tangible, income-generating property offers both long-term value appreciation and consistent cash flow through rent. Even if prices dip temporarily, real estate often recovers stronger due to its essential nature and limited supply.
  • Blue-chip stocks: the big behemoth companies often weather storms better than smaller players. Those that pay dividends provide reliable benefits even when share prices drop. Consumer staples, utilities, and healthcare tend to be resilient too.
  • Treasury bonds: from stable nations’ governments are quite reliable, in particular the United States.  When these mature, investors get a predictable reward.

Exchange-traded funds (ETFs): baskets of assets designed to track the performance of a specific index, sector, or theme. These are very diversified as you’re putting your money in many different baskets.

A graph showing the price-yield curve of a callable bond compared to an option-free bond.

What Are Capital-Protected Investments?

Regardless of how the underlying assets perform, capital-protected investments — financial products — promise to pay back at least your investment upon maturity. This is only if you hold the investment until its full term, often 3-10 years. Yet, you can still earn money off of it. With a large portion of the money invested in a stock market index, a basket of stocks, or commodities which have only a nominal possibility of failing, these funds greatly reduce the risk of capital loss.

Those who wish to diversify their portfolio will find these investments appealing as they are meant to protect investors against the possibility of losing their initial investment.

These innovative financial products provide much-needed protection against the volatility of the market.  Unlike many conventional investment vehicles, which allow big losses to be a very real possibility, these products legally guarantee that, at least once they mature, investors would recover  their original investment amount.

Capital protected investments are a haven for investors who do not wish to risk any of their capital and are looking for an investment with the potential to give better returns than deposit rates. 

Avoiding Neglect

Asset protection is a vital part of financial planning that sometimes gets disregarded until it’s too late. In an unpredictable world where litigation, creditors, and financial hazards abound, securing your possessions is vital.   Here are some primary considerations.

Protecting Your Valuables Against Legal Action

One advantage of asset protection is safeguarding your assets from any litigation.  Particularly business owners run a great danger for possible lawsuits from their staff, consumers, or rivals.  Establishing trusts or limited liability companies among other asset protection techniques helps people guard their assets from being confiscated should a lawsuit arise.

Maintaining Financial Stability

Protecting assets offers a safety net to help you stay financially stable under trying circumstances.  Protecting your assets can help you to negate market volatility, economic downturns, and unanticipated costs without compromising your financial stability.

Bar chart showing the growth of hedge fund assets under management (AUM) in US dollars from 1990 to 2004.

Crowdlending Based on Smart Contract Technology

Business finance is changing in this world. Entrepreneurs now have more choices than merely conventional ones like credit unions and bank loans. One of the new trends providing other routes to generate money is peer-to- peer (P2P) lending. Investors get to spread out their risk by jointly funneling their money into loans, not going it all alone. One such company that runs these is Maclear, which backs such loans with the borrower’s collateral, all in a decentralized fashion.

Screenshot of the website page maclear.ch where Featured Investment Projects are displayed
Conventional Banks Alternative Lenders
Conventional banks are usually regarded as financial entities with a physical branch presence. It includes local community banks as well as larger national and regional banks. Alternative lending is anything not found in a conventional bank. This covers peer-to-peer lending, specialist equipment finance lenders, and internet lenders like Maclear.
Usually, traditional banking institutions have tight standards for commercial loan acceptance. The average rejection rate for auto loans increased by 0.4 percentage points to 11.4% in 2024. Oftentimes, alternative lenders are known to close a gap in the market. Every client, including companies unable to obtain financing from conventional banks, have personal considerations given to them.
Conventional banks have the lowest fixed rates and longest timeframes for repayment. Often offering more flexible repayment terms than conventional loans, alternative lenders approach small businesses based on their individual financial capacities and needs.
Depending on the loan type and length, conventional banks often provide relatively low interest rates. Due to the great risks lenders incur by decreasing acceptance criteria, many alternative lenders demand higher interest rates, especially for unsecured loans; although these greatly lower the entry threshold to get one.

These creative tools provide companies greater freedom and accessibility than traditional means by allowing them to choose from multiple funding sources. But are crowdlending sites the way corporate financing is going to evolve?  Let's consider their advantages.

Diversified portfolio

P2P lending is a great way to diversify a portfolio as lenders get to pick borrowers they feel comfortable with or distribute their money among several different applicants instead of putting all their money into one basket.  Investing your money in numerous different projects reduces the possibility of financial turbulence – the company failing.

Consistent and higher returns

P2P lending is a good approach to invest money as it provides better returns than other kinds of investing like the stock market.  Direct connections between lenders and borrowers allow lenders to enjoy a better interest rate and regular installment returns of their capital.

Bar chart showing the forecast for the Peer to Peer (P2P) lending market size from 2024 to 2034 in USD billions.

For those struggling to keep up with inflation, investing on a P2P platform presents an opportunity to earn significantly higher interest than a conventional savings account or cash ISA. Moneyweek recently broke down the best cash ISAs allowing up to 4.25% rates. As for people with minimal credit history and companies with significant capital needs, this helps to further reduce the risks lenders have to take on and facilitates the loan application process.

Being Part of a Great Cause

Helping to bring creative new concepts and goods into the market is one of the distinct non-financial benefits of being an investor in a crowdlending campaign.   It allows you to participate in something interesting or related to your values.  More and more social entrepreneurs are looking at crowdlending to help them reach their objectives.  Similarly, crowdlending now features social enterprise more extensively.

Conclusion

Crisis-proof investments are all about minimizing risk while preserving growth potential. Whether it’s gold, real estate, capital-protected products, EFTs, or smart contract transactions, the goal is to protect your money from economic shocks. By focusing on stability and smart diversification, you can keep your capital safe and ready for whatever comes next.

If you are curious to learn crowdlending opportunities and the ways Maclear is spearheading societal advancement and social change, sign up for an account today.

Share Article