Who is
Stock Doctor?
My name is Vladimir Zabnin and I am originally from Tallinn, Estonia. In 2009, I started my studies at Tallinn University of Technology (TalTech), majoring in informatics, but dropped out a year and a half later. Besides university, I worked behind the bar, which allowed me to move to Scotland in June 2011 and continue my bartender career alongside the new university that started in September of the same year. In 2012, I had to put my university studies on hold again and serve my mandatory military service as an Estonian citizen. In June 2016, I graduated from the University of Dundee with a BSc in Financial Economics with Honours.
After completing my economics degree, I decided to focus on a start-up idea that two accountancy students and I had developed in my last year of university at their Centre of Entrepreneurship. Our start-up idea won several major financial awards, grants and gave me the status of Honorary Researcher at the University of Dundee.
However, after presenting our start-up idea to several major investors, we had to admit that we couldn’t continue for much longer as all the investors we had approached wanted to see cash flow, which we did not have to show them at the time due to the fact that it was a social network for sports (buddyworld.com) in its infancy. Even though it was tough to accept the defeat at the time, it became a very useful lesson and an important part of my investment strategies today when it comes to cash flow analysis.
Three months later, I got a job as an investment analyst at Alliance Trust Savings, the third largest investment platform in the UK at the time, where I was responsible for setting up stocks, bonds, ETFs, REITs, investment trusts and different types of mutual funds on their investment platforms. As a numbers person, I really liked my role and used every opportunity to learn something new at work. A year later, I became a team leader in the same team, where my new tasks were to analyse data flows of assets and prices of company shares, bonds, and fund units. My new role also gave me the opportunity to become certified by the Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment.
Even though I had learned a lot of important details about investment platforms, investment accounts, asset classes, institutional trading, pricing, and everything else, both academically and professionally, I still felt that something was missing when it came to making my own investment decisions. At that point, I did not know exactly what question I was looking to answer but I kept looking for it by reading, listening, and watching everything I could find about investing. One of those days when I was browsing the internet to find more information on stocks, I happened to listen to an interview of a well-known New York trader, Umar Ashraf, who talked about how he had earned his first million US dollars by trading stocks and what difficulties he had to overcome in his personal journey in order to achieve this. His interview had a profound impact on me, and after completing his ‘Intensive Stock Training’ course in March 2019, I found the answer to the question I was long looking for – “What does it take to successfully invest in the stock markets?”. The answer that I found for myself was: “You need a good understanding of fundamental analysis, dynamic technical analysis skills and not underestimate the importance of investor psychology and investor behaviour in your investment strategy”.
While I had finally established my initial investment strategy and made my first investment decisions based on it, I was offered an investment risk assistant role at Baillie Gifford in their investment risk, analytics, and research department, which I accepted with great enthusiasm. For those not familiar with Baillie Gifford, it is an investment firm that has been managing Scottish Mortgage investment trust (ticker: SMT) which has outperformed the S&P 500 index twice over a 20-year time horizon (as at 1st of June 2023) and was rated as the world’s best stock-picking firm in the 2020 by the Forbes magazine. Colleagues that work in the financial services industry will hopefully agree with my statement that it is not easy to do so, especially in such a long-time horizon.
Accepting the new role also meant that I had to re-design my investment strategy once again – this was because due to the company’s strict dealing policy, I was not permitted to make short-term trades and had to hold on to any investments I made for at least 60 days to abide by the firm’s “long-term investors” ethos. This in turn led me to develop my two current investment strategies, which are ideal for those who work or study full time and are actively looking to grow their investment portfolio. The two investment strategies, that I had developed over the years and that I still use in my everyday investing, work in both raising and falling markets and form the core part of the Stock Doctor’s flagship investment courses taught today.
My investment strategies have helped me financially in three ways:
- helped me get out of debt, a 19-year mortgage was repaid in 3 years and 10 months
- provide me with continuous passive income that now covers all my monthly expenses
- constantly increase my passive income by investing most of my active income
In May 2023, I left the portfolio analytics specialist role at Baillie Gifford and joined the private client firm Beamish International that operates in the alternative assets space (rare & fine whisky) for ultra-high-net-worth individuals as a Head of Portfolio Management, which allowed me to soft launch the Stock Doctor’s flagship investment courses in September 2023 during the course of my employment.
The big change came after I joined BNI (Business Network International) in November 2023, where I was able to talk about Stock Doctor’s flagship investment courses to a full room of business leaders and owners on a weekly basis, who later became my first clients and still make up a big chunk of my client base today. This in turn led me to an official launch of Stock Doctor’s investment courses in January 2024 and the final decision to leave the full time employment in March 2024.
Today, in addition to actively managing my own investment portfolio and teaching Stock Doctor’s investment courses to business leaders, owners and private individuals, I also teach the Finance and Financial Management module at the University of Dundee as part of the UK government’s ‘Help to Grow’ management programme for SMEs and work three days a month as a Head of Portfolio Management at Beamish International managing private client collections of fine & rare whisky.
In developing Stock Doctor’s investment courses, my approach was rooted in the question, “If I were a novice investor with no prior knowledge, what would I teach myself today?” Guided by this principle, all Stock Doctor investment courses prioritise the practical application of knowledge and skills in real-world scenarios, as well as fostering networking opportunities. The evidence clearly demonstrates that this approach is highly effective for investors when it comes to achieving tangible outcomes.
Are you looking to begin your investment journey but feeling uncertain about where to start? Alternatively, have you already been investing but find it challenging to dedicate time to extensive reading and research?
If either situation resonates with you, then I am here to help and simplify the whole process, guiding you on your investor journey!