I have been posting things on how to get the information you needed in your stock investing decision. Also I discussed how could your small savings accumulate and be invested in stock. I hope you have also chosen a stockbroker and on the process of opening an account, the question now is are you ready?
An interview was made on Warren Buffet, one of the world’s richest man, on what regrets he has in life. And I think you will be surprise on his answer. He told that his greatest regret was that he did not start earlier in investing.
Yes stock investing may be scary at first. You keep on looking in the trading result the next day and you always zoom in the last traded price of the stock you bought. You are praying that it is not in the red and when you see its value went down you are as if gonna get a heart attack. You think you made the wrong choice or maybe you are telling yourself “I told you, you should have bought the other stock.” But in reality you never lost anything yet. It has been a wrong notion of many new investors that when your stocks market price is down you lost. We call that unrealized loss. That is why when investing always choose stocks of companies with great fundamentals or as what Warren Buffet’s mentor, Benjamin Graham, term it intrinsic business value. Prices may go up or down but companies with intrinsic value will always be there. Buy them when their prices are down, which are surely temporary that may be due to market reaction to certain news or events, and sell them when they rise up.
Many say stock investing is like gambling. I don’t think so. It is one of the wrong move of some people who sell their stock when it is already way below their cost. They never computed what was their investment’s book value and also they haven’t included their expenses when they purchased their stock investment thus they end up selling at a lost. Always remember to sell beyond your breakeven which can be computed.
One last thing is that you wont be able to start unless you make the first step. Buy your first stock investing only about Php 5,000.00. Yup just buy any stock you think is a good buy. When its price goes down be happy because you have made your first investment taking away that jitter that stops you from doing it. I guess the next buy will be better, and the next one will still better. Why better? of course nobody would like to lose money so your first loss will drive you to be better and be an earner.
Take a deep breath, click your mouse and make that first buy.
About the blogger
Louis Delos Angeles is a Certified Public Accountant, blogger behind Investing in Philippines, and author of Investing in Stocks: Preparing for the future small amount at a time. Learn more about Louis and his financial freedom advocacy here.
