Mark Cuban just tripled his stake in popular cryptocurrency Dogecoin — from $500 to $1,500.

Of course, for a billionaire shark and owner of the Dallas Mavericks, that’s not exactly a big chunk of change.

While Cuban has been highly supportive of Dogecoin, calling it the “people’s way to pay” back in August, he recently told Fox Business that he owns the token just “for fun.”

“I’ve never told anybody it’s a great investment,” Cuban added.

So what is a great investment in the eyes of Cuban?

Well, he’s been bullish on two specific stocks for quite some time now — Netflix and Amazon.

In April, he even bet $1 million that they’d beat the S&P 500 over the next 10 years.

Let’s take a quick look at the pair of tech gorillas. One (or both) might be worth purchasing with your digital nickels and dimes.

Netflix (NFLX)

In an interview last year, Cuban noted that he had owned Netflix since it was trading at $50 per share.

With the stock currently boasting a price of $633, Cuban’s return on Netflix sits at about 1,100% — assuming he still holds those shares.

Netflix was the best performing S&P 500 component of the last decade.

Naturally, that performance was nicely enhanced by the pandemic-induced, stay-at-home environment we’ve been living in over the past two years.

In Q2 of 2021, Netflix added 1.5 million subscribers, bringing its total paying membership base to over 209 million. That helped revenue grow 19% year over year to $7.3 billion.

But Netflix isn’t without competition.

Its success has inspired giants like Disney and Apple to launch their own subscription-based streaming platforms, suggesting that the next decade won’t be quite as epic for shareholders as the last one.

If you’re on the fence about Netflix, some investing apps can give you a free share of Apple or Disney just for signing up.

Amazon (AMZN)

Amazon is another big winner for Cuban. He loaded up on shares of the e-commerce giant when they were trading at $500 to $700 apiece and added more at just under $2,000.

Story continues

Today, the stock is at over $3,200.

While Amazon’s most recent quarterly results didn’t blow out expectations — the stock is actually down 5% over the past month — business is still firing on all cylinders.

In Q2, sales totaled a whopping $113.1 billion, representing a 27% increase year over year.

The bottom line turned out to be even more impressive: Amazon earned a profit of $7.8 billion for the quarter compared to $5.2 billion in the year-ago period.

Mega-cap tech stocks like Amazon tend to command high price tags.

But the good news? You can get a piece of the company using an app that allows you to buy fractions of shares with as much money as you are willing to spend.

A finer alternative

Just a quick word of caution: Stocks — even great ones — don’t always go up.

After all, someone was willing to take the other side of Cuban’s bet.

To earn life-changing investment returns, you don’t need to limit yourself to the stock market, or the crypto market, for that matter.

If you want to invest in something that has very little correlation with the violent swings of the stock market, you might want to consider an overlooked asset — fine art.

Investing in fine art by the likes of Banksy and Andy Warhol used to be an option only for the ultra-rich like Cuban.

But with a new investing platform, you can invest in iconic artworks too, just like Jeff Bezos and Peggy Guggenheim.

According to the Citi Global Art Market chart, contemporary artwork has offered a return of 14% per year over the past 25 years, easily topping the 9.5% annual return from the S&P 500.

This article provides information only and should not be construed as advice. It is provided without warranty of any kind.

A recent Gallup poll has shown that the number of investors who own bitcoin has tripled since 2018. U.S. investors are showing increasing interest in the digital asset. The number which sat at 2% back in 2018 has now tripled in 2021 as that number now sits at 6%. The investors included in the poll were investors who owned $10,000 or more worth of stocks, bonds, and/or mutual bonds.

Ownership among investors aged 18 to 49 had grown 10 percentage points to 13%, up 10% from just 3% back in 2018. While investors aged 50 and older, only 3% said they owned bitcoin. Compared to 1% from back in 2018, showing the number had tripled in the last three years.

Risk Tolerance For Bitcoin On The Rise

From 2018 until now, the number of investors who think bitcoin is “too risky” to invest has been declining steadily. The poll showed that following the 6% of investors that confirmed they already owned bitcoin now, another 2% of investors said they would most likely buy into the digital asset in the near future.  In comparison to 2018, less than 0.5% of investors had said that they would probably buy the cryptocurrency in the near future.

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The number of investors who said they would never buy bitcoin had also dropped. The poll in 2018 had shown that 72% of investors said they would never consider buying into bitcoin, showing absolutely no interest in the digital asset. Now that number has dropped from 72% to 58% who say they would never consider buying into the digital asset.

The survey also consisted of a section that had investors who were curious about the digital asset but did not think they would be buying into the asset anytime soon. The percentage of investors in this category was 34%, up from the 26% in 2018 who had said they were intrigued but would not be buying into the asset.

Age And Sex Disparities

Gallup’s poll also featured a separation of the information into age groups and sex. Bitcoin ownership was up all across the board. Interest in the digital asset was also up with investors that were surveyed in comparison to the 2018 data.

Related Reading | Bitcoin Volume Continues To See Yearly Lows As Price Struggles To Recover

The report showed that the percentage of women who currently own bitcoin in the U.S. is currently 3%, up from 1% in 2018. While in men, the number of investors who own the digital asset in 2021 is now 11%, up tremendously from a mere 3% back in 2018.

Age disparities also showed a clear demarcation. Investors who were aged 18 to 49 were more likely to own the digital asset and investors over 50 years of age were less likely to own. Older investors who had no interest in ever buying or owning the digital asset was 80%, the highest of any group.

BTC price currently trades above $32,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

The sex disparity in investors regarding bitcoin was the same throughout the board. Male investors were more likely to own or invest in bitcoin than female investors.

Sentiments towards the digital asset have moved more towards the positive in the past three years. The percentage of investors who considered the asset “very risky” in 2018 was 75%, now that number is down to 60%. 35% of investors said they still consider the asset “somewhat risky,” while 5% said they did not consider the asset “not too risky” or “not risky at all.”

Featured image from NewsBTC, chart from TradingView.com