About Coin & Cortex
Coin & Cortex explains the psychology of money: why perfectly sensible people overpay, overspend and put off the boring stuff, and which small, practical systems help. We do it with hand-drawn doodle videos on YouTube and with longer, sourced articles on the blog.
Our recurring doodle character, Sam, stands in for all of us: smart enough to know better, human enough to do it anyway.
Who is behind it
Coin & Cortex is an independent project published by Maximilian Hölzl from Austria (full details in the Impressum). It is not a bank, a financial adviser or a product comparison site, and it is not affiliated with any company we write about.
We are not licensed financial advisers, and we don't pretend to be. Our job is to translate well-established research in behavioral economics and psychology, and the findings of consumer regulators, into plain English and practical habits. Where a topic needs a professional (tax, legal, investment decisions), we say so.
What we cover
- Fair prices: personalized and dynamic pricing, the loyalty penalty, and how to check you're paying a fair price.
- Money mind: why intelligence doesn't protect you from money mistakes, and the systems that do.
- Spending & lifestyle creep: why earning more doesn't automatically make you richer.
- Work, time & money: the history of how we work, and money as hours of your life.
Editorial standards
- Sources first. Every factual claim in an article is backed by a source we link at the end: peer-reviewed studies (usually via their DOI), official regulator or government publications, or established institutions. We prefer well-replicated findings over one-off headlines.
- No invented numbers. We never make up statistics, studies, quotes or experts. Example numbers are labelled as examples. If a famous claim is contested or a quote is probably misattributed, we say so.
- Written to last. We avoid time-bound statistics, current prices and "deal of the month" content, so an article stays useful for years. Where specific tools are useful, they go in a clearly marked, swappable appendix, never as paid placements.
- Practical, not preachy. Each article should leave you with something concrete to do. We describe general habits, not personal financial advice.
- Corrections. If you spot an error or a broken source, email coinandcortex@gmail.com. We check every report and fix confirmed errors in the article.
How we use AI
We use AI tools as assistants: for research support, first drafts, the narration voice in our videos and the doodle illustrations. AI output is never published unchecked. Claims are checked against the linked sources before publishing, and the publisher is responsible for everything on this site.
How the site is funded
There are no ads, no affiliate links, no sponsored posts and no tracking on this website. Coin & Cortex sells one product of its own, the Switching Day Kit, and we mention it in articles where it genuinely fits the topic. The Fair Price Protocol checklist is free, with no sign-up.
Contact
Questions, corrections or ideas for a topic: coinandcortex@gmail.com. For new videos, subscribe on YouTube.