Besides putting money into portfolios, what advice would you give young investors who are looking to invest money for both short term goals (5 years) and long term goals (more than 15 years)?

Generally, the difference in your investment horizon of 5 and 15 years could lead to different ways to manage those investments. However, it will also depend more on other factors such as your age, your personal circumstances, your needs for those investment goals. Are they like retirement (something that is a must to secure a certain standard of living) or is it a car (for which you can afford to delay the goal a little and have flexibility, etc.) - It is hard to generalize. But if we do just take all other things being equal just a time horizon towards investing then obviously the shorter time horizon means you will have less appetite for risk and volatility of returns. We can maybe 1) diversify your asset classes to diversify risk - it is the only free lunch for us! 2) own more fixed income - maybe further out in the duration risk/credit risk to achieve a more stable source of returns, 3) make sure we are not taking undue risk - for example FX or other risks that we should take into account to raise the probability of success of our investments. At Endowus, we invest in SGD hedged bond funds that are diversfied and low costs so volatility is lower for the returns you get. Hope this helps!

Long term - Bonds

Short term - Stocks / Mutual funds!

Stock picking can be done too if you wish but the risk is high.