Fortunately, I met this young lady (wolf whistle) who would come to see me at work so I told her my plan. She encouraged me and that was the push I needed.
I opened up an account with an online brokerage firm with only $3k to get my feet wet. As I continued to read and educate myself I added another $4k. A cash account is very basic no margin I could not buy and sell often. After a sale the money takes 3 days to settle so I couldn't day trade, otherwise I would be freeriding. I believe this was good it allowed me to take a breather on every trade I made as I had no structure. I added another $3k in the following 3 months. That was a lot of money for me at the time, being young it was a tough decision. I had always wanted a flat screen TV but I passed it up so I could invest.
Eventually I opened a margin account although some recommend not to. I made sure I understood the dangers of buying with borrowed money. I also learned to buy options contracts as a way to hedge from high risk investments such as pharmaceutical companies going through the clinical trial process. Yes, I did take big losses but I managed to recover. It was like a very expensive class that ended up paying off. I made plenty of mistakes, I am not perfect but you don't need to be to make money trading stocks. I was fortunate enough to have bought at a time when everyone was selling and scared to invest but that is another topic I will discuss on a later post. Young adults should not evade stocks. Being young is a good thing, we have time in our favor. Older people can also benefit from the use of stocks especially those that pay dividends.
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