If I am 18 y.o., Where should I invest my $300?
Question:
Answer:
2 Choices:
1) Open an Account with Sharebuilder.com and invest the money on Shares in either Anheuser-Busch(BUD), Walmart (WMT), Union Pacific (UNP), Canadian Pacific (CP.) or Toyota (TM) - Sharebuilder are alot cheaper than other traders because they buy the stocks for their clients in one bulk block every week and split them between the clients (instead of lots of individual $1,000+ trades with a $10 commission fee)... because of this it also allows you to buy fractions of stocks in a company e.g. you stick $100 on stocks in a company with valued at $200/share you still get 0.5 shares in that company.
Before investing in stocks.. learn everything you can about them.
2) Invest in some gold bullion - either in bar or coin form.
drugs.
For $300, you're better off putting it in a savings account unless you plan to contribute on a regular basis (ie monthly) to the account.
Most places charge fees for accounts under $2000 and your fees will eat up anything you can make unless you hit it really big.
If you plan to contribute monthly, you'll have to shop around. Each company has different offers to allow you to grow your savings consistently.
Or consider opening a Roth IRA account. It's an investment account that allows you to grow the money tax free. Again most require a $2000 minimum deposit, but some places will do it for a little as $500. Anything you make on your principal can't be taken out until you retire, but when you do, the money you made will be 100% tax free! Also if you're in an emergency, according to IRA rules you can pull the initial investment out with no penalities since you've already paid taxes on it.
open up a roth I.R.A.
start now, and try to put in as much as you can each year. its the incredible power of compound interest. assuming you have an ok job for your adult life you'll have a massive amount of cash for you when you cash out. and its relatively low risk.
Buy some EE bonds or put it in a mutual fund. Check out the American Balanced Funds by American Funds. It has an almost 10% return on the last 10 years.
ING, they pay over 4% on savings. You need a bank account to transfer the money to ING because they are only on line. ( other companies require $100,000 to pay 4%)
In very short, you should invest in mutual funds
Dont buy stocks or shares its a load of hype
the return on stocks can be great but there is a greater risk and if you're a gambler i say go for it. Just do some research on some companies and pick the one that looks the best.
Bonds are secure and will most likely have a return but it will be slow.
savings is very secure but also is slow in return
mutual funds is good. faster than bonds and savings but return won't be as much as stocks can get.
Personally, in one day owning stocks i've earned $100 but then again in one day I've lost $250. Overall, I'm ahead because I've had my stocks for a couple of years and the return was about 20%
Do you have any knowledge of stock or debt markets?
If not, I would not advise you to invest you blindly. At best, you investment will outgrow inflation rate.
Do not be that silly, $300 bucks that you have earned or received from your parents are not worth investing at all.
What is reasonable, in my opinion, is to create a virtual portfolio somewhere at www.bloomberg.com (absolutely free and riskless procedure) and monitor its growth.
After you've got some practice and read several books on investing (do not think that even an idiot can invest profitably) try it on your own.
Buy a young company's stocks worth of $300. Then put it in your safe deposit and check the new stock price 30 years later.
I suggest you to keep saving until you have at least $500.00 and then you can open a brokerage account at Scotrade.
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Buy XOM and hold it forever.
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