“Congratulations! The big 18!”
…
So?
This exact scenario took place multiple times last weekend on my birthday. I wondered what’s sooo special about being 18? I feel the same, but now that I’m an adult, what is different? I can be charged as an adult in court, join the army, and buy lottery tickets; hmmm so fun! Not to sound materialistic but the best part of my birthday besides being able to spend time with my friends and family was the money I received. I gained about $650 and began to think about what I should do with this spare money to be financially smart. That is when it hit me, I can invest!? One issue that arose, I have no clue what I’m doing and I don’t want it to merely go to waste. But with my few takeaways from Consumer Economics and no other business class, I learned that taxes suck, how a credit card works, and to start investing young.
Beginning of This Week, Where I Began:
Firstly, I searched for a platform to begin my investing journey. I found the more popular options such as Robin Hood, Vanguard, and Fidelity but realized they took a decent amount of commissions although all were pretty reputable. That is when I stumbled across a promotion for the platform WeBull stating that upon acquiring their app and depositing $500 dollars or more into the brokerage account then I would receive 25 free fractional shares valued from $3-3000. The flaunting of free money and my need for any money I could get entering college obviously made me intrigued, so I looked further into it. Luckily the app was backed and trusted by a vast amount of investors and took ZERO commission. In comparison to the other platforms, I was sold. I downloaded the WeBull on the Monday following my birthday and went back and forth as to whether I should deposit the $650 or not and if that little amount of cash would even make me any profits in the market. I initiated the deposit before going to bed that night and received the instant buying power of $650 but the fractional shares would take about 6 business days to be given to me along with the actual arrival of the wire to my account. But what now?
Mid-Week Progress:
Come the third period of Tuesday, I have study hall with the finance gurus Sean Young and Fisher Muck as well as THE Adam Alshika in my Strength and Performance. So, I picked their brains and began asking what I should invest in and what I needed to know. They happily, and I emphasize happily, started to spew knowledge and numbers at me for the rest of the week. The most common stock that was mentioned and that came with the lowest risk and decent reward was the S&P 500. Arguably one of the most stable and consistent stocks; the ETF which buys into the top Fortune 500 companies in the United States has never failed to provide its stakeholders with an average of 10% APY since its IPO in the 1860’s. Yes, I can play it safe and I very much plan to invest in the S&P, but it just does not align with the investment plan I devised. I figured that as experts say, continuously reinvesting into stocks steadily will set you up in a very nice position 30-40 years down the line, but I can’t wait and the S&P was literally setting record highs (as it usually does) while I stared at it. My plan is this, once I have a substantial income come to the summertime and no school or lacrosse to create work conflicts, I will hopefully devote roughly a quarter of each paycheck to the S&P but for now, with the $650, I need to take on a slightly higher risk and reward play. This is because I see myself needing the money more near the end of college and want to see a quicker return. Fisher and the gurus definitely did not like this plan as much given the volatility, but they were still happy I was investing at this age. So my research began to find my “breadwinner” of a stock that would hopefully “go to the moon”.
End of The Week, Thursday-Friday:
The research began and my watchlist was growing. I believe these sectors will grow, the lithium-ion battery providers as electric vehicles take over, technology, but in specific my focus is AI as it is sprouting everywhere. I also see this market booming for the next 3-4 years which aligns perfectly with my financial timeline before I sell and reinvest or continue to hold if it is doing really well in the foreseeable future. I found a few companies that offered flashy dividends and enticing expensive stocks before settling on one. I bought twenty shares of it at $25 dollars a share ($500) and it is bound to join the Fortune 500 and exceed its market cap in the coming years. I also bought a fractional share of Nvidia as they are doing very well with my remaining $150. After buying the stocks early Friday morning I have unfortunately only watched them lose a few dollars but that means nothing as I am playing the long-term game and all stocks do this. I also created a savings account now that I am 18 and am getting 4.65% APY on all cash within it, so that is cool too. Let’s hope all goes well and I did not just lose all of that birthday money lol.