Saturday, December 19, 2009

Why You Should Invest In The Stock Market - Part 2

By Zigfred Diaz

In my previous article, the first part on the advantages or the reasons why you should invest in the stock market was discussed. Three points are highlighted, mainly potential for greater returns, part ownership of the company you are investing and belonging to a special group of people. This is the second part of this two part series. Check out my blog should you wish to view the article in its entirety.

4.) It still one of the best vehicles of investment - Even if the stock market has its up and down moments, investing long term in the stock market will still give you one of the highest returns making it one of the best vehicle of investments ever. Returns in the stock market fluctuate yearly. For example, in 1986 the Philippine stock market recorded the highest return rate at 224 %. On the other hand the lowest rate of return was in 1997 at negative 41 %. However the average return (within 20 years) is still somewhere from 24 % to 28 % per year. This means that the long term investor always wins in the long run.

5.) Helps you become more financially literate and inspires you to increase that knowledge - Investing in the stock market forces you to go over the business news. It also helps you give significant meaning to the major news headlines. News for you is not something to be discussed in chit chats, but rather you view it as something that will have an impact on how the market behaves. You are forced to understand words that are foreign to you. You will become more sharper intellectually as you are motivated to keep on reading. If you dozed off in your your economics class in high school or college, this time you will be pulling your hair apart just to figure out what inflation means. you will be motivated to become a life long student.

6.) Helps you understand the importance of being online and getting instant "knowledge" in this age of information technology. - Man has gone a long way from the stone age, the iron age, bronze age up to the industrial age. Now we have moved one more step ahead as we are right now in the "information technology age" where knowledge is power. Trading in the stock market by means of utilizing information technology certainly gives meaning to the adage that "knowledge is power." Years ago when I was still in college I wanted to know what it is like to invest in the stock market as I was intrigued by what I see in the movies when traders shout buy or sell. Unfortunately, I did not invest back then because of the lack of information, capability and most of all the lack of capital to do so.

The advent of the internet age has certainly changed a lot of things. The information technology is powered by the internet and information on anything is accessible via the world wide web. This has also the changed the way stock market trading is done. Because of this I am now able to do everything online such as monitoring the business news, buying and selling shares of stocks and transferring money to and from my accounts. A future development would be to trade stocks globally. Although this might prove to be a much more complicated area of study nevertheless the principles of stock trading are similar.

7.) Investing in the Stock Market helps build the nation -This is the most noble objective and advantage as to why you should invest in the stock market. One of the main reasons why companies want to get listed in the stock exchange is that they want to infuse more capital into their business. The reason why they want more capital is they want to expand the business. More capital means more business, more business means more jobs, more jobs means more needs of the average Filipinos are being met. More business also means more taxes for the government. In a sense when you invest money in the stock market you are actually helping create jobs and at the same time more taxes for the government. This increase in economic activity helps build the nation.

These reasons certainly make a compelling argument as to why you should invest in the stock market. - 23309

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Stock Market - Basic Principles - Part 4

By Zigfred Diaz

This is the last installment of the series on stock market investment principles. We discussed about the first seven principles in the past three articles. Now we will be discussing the last three principles. If you wish to view the article in its entirety please visit my blog.

8.) You must devote your time to study - When you want to invest in the stock market you should devote time to study what it's all about. You can't just place in your money and hope that it will somehow grow someday. You have to read books and materials on the stock market. When I started investing I dug out materials in the internet related to the stock market especially the Philippine stock market. I bought books on the stock market. The Philippine stock exchange has an "investor's primer" for those who are new to the stock market. (See the Philippine stock exchange website for more information.)

You can also attend seminars on how to trade in the stock market. Several brokerage firms have conducted free seminars for those who are new to the stock market. I attended a 2 day seminar by CITISEC Online last year. CITISEC online is one of the most innovative, well managed and most active brokerage firms in the country. The information that you could learn is astounding. Studying the stock market requires continual study. You should not stop learning.

Read all the materials you can and attend all the seminars you can in order to learn. Don't be discouraged when there are terms you could not understand. For example just reading this post alone, you would probably raise your hands and tell yourself not to invest anymore since there are some terms you could not understand. You don't even know what "points" are when I was talking about them in point number 2. You don't even know what the heck is the Philippine Stock Exchange Index (PSEi) or what does "Blue Chips" or "Bull run" mean. Worse you don't even understand what a stock is and how it basically works. But so what? I started out not knowing what some of these things are.

Most of these things were never taught in school. But I learned slowly by reading and experiencing it myself. You should watch the movie "Pursuit of Happyness" You will be inspired on how one man's struggle to learn the stock market has led him to make millions through stock market trading.

9.) You must know your current events - A lot of factors can affect the stock market. You should read the news paper as this may give you a clue on what direction the market may take. More importantly you should read the business news as this may give you an idea as to which stock you should buy. I read the Philippine Daily Inquirer everyday in order to have an idea where the market is headed.

10.) Don't delay today is the best day to start - Experience is the best way to learn. You may start small but the most important thing is that you start right away. Put off procrastination. Study how to go about it without rushing, but don't delay. If you already know the basics about investments start buying your first stock. Making your first profit from your first sale is truly rewarding. - 23309

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