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Are you an active investor in the stock market or are you index funds all the way?
Today’s guest is Mabel Nunez from Girl$ on the Money. She ONLY invests in individual company stocks.
Say what!?! No VTSAX? No FSTVX?
Nope. Nothing. Just pure shares of individual publicly traded companies. There’s a secret to her investing strategy…….. and it’s that anyone can do what she is doing! She walks us through her reasonings on what companies she buys and what companies she sells.
You’re going to learn a ton!
We also chat about…
- how the current political climate affects the market
- how Gwen & J first learned about the stock market
- whether J & Gwen have individual stocks in their portfolio
She was an absolute delight to speak with! Enjoy this chat with Mabel, and please subscribe to us in iTunes if you enjoyed it!
Show notes and links from today’s episode
- Yahoo! Finance
- Morningstar
- Wall Street Journal
- Girl$ on the Money <– Mabel’s blog
- Mabel’s Insta
Key takeaways from our chat with Mabel
1 – You don’t have to have a degree in Finance to be a successful investor
The more Mabel started to learn about the stock market, the more she realized how useless her degree in Finance was for investing.
Peter Lynch has a famous quote that says “Everyone has the brainpower to follow the stock market. If you made it through fifth-grade math, you can do it.” Companies want you to think it’s complicated so you’ll pay someone to do it for you, but it’s actually pretty easy to understand once you get into it.
2 – Do your due diligence for investing
Research potential investments like they’re your ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend that you found on Insta. You should know EVERYTHING about the company. Ok, maybe just what you can find easily on the internet.
Read lots of articles on the company. Do they have any outstanding court cases? Are they poised to make a huge sale or have an epic new product come on the market? Do they have any competition? What are their business practices like? Do they have a positive image online? All of these questions and more should be a factor in your decision.
3 – Diversify companies and industries
As tempting as it may be to only buy shares in one sector, make sure you’re diversified across industries and sectors. Domestic goods, technology companies, pharmaceutical companies, and maybe even some international companies would be a good start to a diversified portfolio.
Mabel likes to have a diversified portfolio so she doesn’t lose everything if one sector has a bad quarter or year.
4 – Act like you’re going to buy the company
Check out the competition. What are they offering that your company of interest isn’t?
Check out Investor Relations tab on company websites (10k annual report, 10Q is quarterly report). It might seem like a lot of mumbo jumbo, but you don’t have to read every single word in the reports.
Start small – $600 is good to test the waters. You don’t have to go in all the way right at the beginning. If it makes you nervous to buy a lot of shares at once, there’s no shame in dollar cost averaging until you’re comfortable with the amount.
5 – Fractional Share Companies
There are some options for buying partial shares so you don’t have to buy one very expensive share of a company (like Alphabet or Berkshire Hathaway) all at once. Some options include:
Betterment (robo advisor)
Stockpile
E-Trade
Be sure to check the fees before you commit!
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