How to Rebalance a Crypto Portfolio - Step By Step to Success

Rebalancing your portfolio is a tactical strategy that protects traders from taking on too much unforeseen risk. Rebalancing is purchasing or disposing of assets to get back to a predetermined asset allocation.

We'll go over the process of rebalancing a portfolio, the benefits of doing so frequently, and some best rebalancing methods on the market. For further instructions on how to rebalance your portfolio, go to our step-by-step tutorial.

How to Rebalance a Portfolio - Four Techniques For Success

The answer to how to rebalance a portfolio is using some strategies. Rebalancing a cryptocurrency portfolio is not a one-size-fits-all process. The most frequently employed techniques are these four.

• ‍Threshold portfolio rebalancing

This investment strategy applies rigorous tolerance ranges to limit the swings of each asset. Consider capping all increases and decreases at 10%. Depending on the circumstances, you either sell or acquire an asset once it moves past this threshold.

Let's say you wish to distribute your assets equally between Bitcoin and ETH. The maximum permitted split is 55/45, with a 5% tolerance. If BTC falls in value, you sell it to buy ETH, and vice versa.

In this case, the market and the threshold width are the two variables that will determine how effective your plan is. Your threshold can be set either high or low, but neither choice is fail-safe. Your threshold determines how much volatility you experience. 

The lower it is, the lower the return. Rebalancing will happen more frequently but at a higher expense. Of course, low thresholds are more likely to be breached by high-volatility crypto assets.

A high threshold allows for increased volatility and returns because breaching is less likely. Your overall costs are lower because the requirement for rebalancing occurs less frequently.

• ‍Constant proportion portfolio insurance (CPPI)

This cryptocurrency rebalancing technique necessitates investing a portion of your money in stablecoins. The fundamental tenet is that risk and wealth have a linear relationship. It gets more complicated as you get more. Stablecoins are used as a portion of the portfolio to shield it from excessive volatility.

What if the market booms when you solely possess cryptocurrencies? At first, look, making a sizable profit should make you joyful. The drawback is that a single retrace might erase everything and leave you in the hole.

• ‍Periodic Rebalancing

The approach emphasizes time rather than ratios or value. Rebalancing of cryptocurrency portfolios takes place at regular periods, such as hourly, daily, weekly, or monthly. The same elements that affect threshold rebalancing also affect the ideal frequency.

Higher transaction costs are associated with a shorter rebalancing interval, but on the plus side, there is less portfolio drift. Longer intervals result in lower adjustment costs, but the portfolio drift increases. What to choose will rely on how you feel about how far it can veer from the initial or desired allocation.

One of the straightforward portfolio management techniques is this one. Calculating danger or keeping track of time is not necessary. We only need to start the rebalancing process by your timeline.

• ‍Percentage Portfolio Rebalancing

Absolute percentage-based investment allocations are specified together with a range of permitted deviations in percentage portfolio rebalancing. The trader rebalances the entire portfolio back to the desired allocations if any of the owned coins rise or fall over the goal amount and the permitted corridor.

Let's say that you want to distribute each coin with 25% of the total. Next, you decide on a +/-5% absolute permitted deviation. As a result, without rebalancing, the allocation proportion of a coin may change from 20% to 30% of the portfolio. Anything outside those bands would need to be balanced again.

What is Crypto Rebalancing?

Financial experts are in the favour of rebalancing strategies for many years. The optimal ratio between your coins and tokens determines how it works in cryptocurrency. This phrase is self-explanatory: Each asset receives a fixed share of the total portfolio value. The holder restores the target allocation whenever it departs from it through manual or automatic trades.

Digital assets are infamous for constantly changing in value. They are kept within an investment portfolio's original proportion by rebalancing. Cryptocurrency rebalancing will maintain the balance between all of your weightings even if the market becomes chaotic.

How Often Should You do Crypto Rebalancing?

You can take profits and rebalance your risk quotients by rebalancing a diverse portfolio. Particularly for portfolios with more assets, portfolios with shorter rebalance time intervals perform better than those with longer intervals. An hourly rebalancing method can take a lot of time, thus it might not be practical for inexperienced or casual traders. Beginner traders may be better served by selecting a longer and easier-to-manage time interval.

According to Hacker Noon's research into rebalancing and cryptocurrency portfolio diversification, portfolios with more cryptocurrency coins and tokens have the best chance of outperforming hourly rebalancing. By rebalancing hourly as opposed to HODLing, stated gains in portfolio growth increased by as much as 234%.

Step-by-Step Guide to Rebalance a Portfolio

Learn how to rebalance a crypto portfolio and control risks in the turbulent cryptocurrency market with this step-by-step tutorial.

• ‍Step 1: Choose the Portfolio Balance Approach That Best Fits Your Investing and Trading Style

The kind and frequency of portfolio rebalancing required to depend on the trader's investment strategy and style. When compared to a portfolio with one or two stable currencies and one or two high-risk tokens, higher-risk investments — such as volatile coins, recently issued tokens, and those with little market capitalization — often require more regular rebalancing. Before beginning with your investment's first allocation, choose the rebalancing plan that best fits your particular approach and risk tolerance.

• ‍Step 2: Decide on your initial cryptocurrency asset allocation

You should choose the starting investment mix and balance. If you've already begun trading, divide your current portfolio into the cryptocurrency asset allocation you choose following your risk management plan and the assets you now hold. For instance, a trader might invest 40% of their portfolio value in a cryptocurrency with a high market cap, such as BTC, 20% in ETH, and the remaining 40% in two initial coin offerings (ICOs) and two altcoins, each at a 10% allocation.

• ‍Step 3: Rebalancing your cryptocurrency portfolio

Buying and selling the coins or tokens must achieve your set investment allocation with a periodic technique. You can also utilize threshold rebalancing or portfolio rebalancing. Setting a percentage deviation from your allocation that you don't want to be exceeded is the basis of threshold rebalancing. According to absolute changes in your percentage allocation, percentage rebalancing modifies allocations.

• ‍Step 4: Make the Trades

Purchase and sell the cryptocurrencies that will return your asset allocation to your initial objectives. Try to conduct transactions as close together as possible if you're manually rebalancing your crypto portfolio without the use of rebalancing tools. Also, you must track every transaction if you want to accurately compare investment performance in the future. Tracking capital gains will be helpful for tax purposes in the USA.

According to the applicable local tax regulations, you may or may not be required to record all rebalancing transactions. However, it is best to record all trading activity for analyzing purposes.

Should You Use Any Rebalancing Strategy?

Rebalancing strategies entail changing the weightings (allocations) of your portfolio. Rebalancing has certain benefits and drawbacks similar to other crypto techniques. So, do you need to use it?

• ‍Advantages

Limiting your risk exposure is the main benefit of rebalancing your cryptocurrency portfolio. When an item appreciates more than it ought to, you should sell it to free up space for other investments. On the downside, you are forced to sell underperforming assets and reinvest the proceeds in more profitable ones.

Diversification is also added during rebalancing. If you win an excessive amount of money, you might improve your portfolio by allocating funds to more assets. Also, your risk exposure decreases as your assets increase. The impact of a lost asset is less when compared to your overall capital when you have enough assets.

You won't become overly connected to possessions if you routinely rebalance. On paper, a resource and its use case might make sense. There is no use in investing if it doesn't generate demand and draw in customers. You may hold off for a month, two, or even a year. Yet if the asset doesn't bring in money, you no longer have the motive to hold it.

• ‍Disadvantages

The primary drawback of rebalancing a cryptocurrency portfolio is uncertainty. According to the theory, Low-performing assets are thought to rise while high-performing ones fall. I sell the latter to purchase the former and profit indefinitely.

There is no unobservable force that pushes an asset up after it rises and pulls it down after it descends. There's a chance that if I sell an asset, its value may increase more. Then, I'll end up losing money on a good asset. It would be much more awful if the reinvestment money went toward an asset that hadn't moved before but now did, albeit in the incorrect direction.

Rebalancing my portfolio only benefits me when assets that gained value decline in value and vice versa. If the contrary occurs, I miss out on a chance and lose money.

Another significant barrier to rebalancing a portfolio is transaction costs. You will incur significant trading fees and transaction charges if you regularly rebalance. Moreover, frequent trades might not benefit all investors. Those from primitive nations that tax every trade might want to steer clear of rebalancing.

• ‍Our Thought

Rebalancing undoubtedly has some disadvantages. But these are outweighed by its benefits. That's why we advise employing rebalancing techniques. However, do your research before making any changes to your portfolio.

Final Word

Rebalancing a cryptocurrency portfolio is a helpful strategy that traders employ to control trading risks. Selling overperforming assets and purchasing underperforming ones allows a diligent investor to sustain gains. Traders can use either the threshold-based or periodic rebalancing procedures, or a combination of the two, to balance risk control and cost reductions. Although there are several risks associated with rebalancing a portfolio, most rebalancing strategies beat HODL strategies in most cases.