Data & methodology
How TickerCompare sources and calculates everything you see, in plain terms.
Where the prices come from
Price history comes from Yahoo Finance: daily closing prices for each ETF and stock. Fund details (fees, domicile, index, distribution policy) are compiled from the fund providers' own factsheets.
How often it updates
Market data is refreshed once a day, automatically, after the trading day ends. These are end-of-day prices, not live intraday quotes, which is the right level of detail for the long-term, buy-and-hold decisions this site is built for.
Everything is shown in US dollars
A fund may trade in USD, EUR, GBP, SGD or another currency. To compare like with like, every price is converted to US dollars using historical exchange rates before any return is calculated, so currency swings are reflected in what you see.
How returns are calculated
Returns are total returns over each period (1 month to max history). "Worst drop" is the largest peak-to-trough fall in the window, and "volatility" is the annualised standard deviation of returns, a rough measure of how bumpy the ride has been.
How the portfolio projection works
The portfolio simulator is a model, not a prediction. It takes each holding's historical return, applies a haircut (it uses 75% of the past return for the "realistic" line, because the past was unusually strong), and projects three scenarios forward. Real markets will not move in a smooth line.
Limitations to keep in mind
- End-of-day data can lag, and free data can occasionally have gaps or errors.
- Past performance is not a reliable guide to future results.
- Newer funds have short histories, so their long-period figures may be missing or less meaningful.
- Nothing here is personal financial advice. See about.