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Brisbane woman Alex is investing in shares and cryptocurrency to build up her wealth and currently has $100,000 scattered across her portfolio.
The designer has been investing for the past six years and is chucking in $450 a week towards investments.
“I invest in shares on multiple platforms. I have a Spaceship investment app, Raiz is another similar type platform for shares, Bamboo which is investing in Bitcoin, silver and gold and I have a few cryptocurrency wallets,” Alex, who didn’t want her surname revealed, told news.com.au.
“I would like to make my money work for me. I don’t think I’ll get too much richer working full time so I am some what of a risktaker, which is why I started buying individual shares myself. I research them and look at charts and I didn’t do too tell well in some instances, but I definitely learnt a lot of lessons and found that jumping into shares and then quickly selling them when the price drops, as I got scared, wasn’t the right thing to do.”
From Spaceship alone, Alex said she’s making a return of $14,500.
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The 33-year-old believes the younger generation needs more financial education and support to invest in different areas and “not just property like our parents”.
“I was calling up to get a financial advisor as I wanted help to put money in the right shares and two people said ‘I’m not going to help you as you don’t have enough money’ and they were leaning toward retirees who pull out their super to invest,” she said.
“So I think there is a gap there and a missed opportunity. I was taken aback by that, because I don’t have a few millions dollars in super to throw into shares they weren’t interested in talking to me.”
Younger people also have the benefit of being able to take a few more risks with their money, she added.
“People that I have spoken to, older people in their sixties, they all buy shares in banks and big corporations as that’s what they have grown up investing in,” she said. “I think the younger generation is a little bit more open to risk and I have friends that are my age buying individual shares on start ups and smaller companies hoping for a bigger gain.”
She has also been trialling the New Zealand app, Sharesies, which has just launched in Australia.
Sharesies claims it will be the first ever investment platform to offer Australians a way to buy a part of a share in companies on the ASX, as well as US and NZ stocks, with no minimum spend.
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Sharesies’ vision is to remove the traditional barriers to trading, cutting the red tape for people looking to build their financial health and literacy, according to the company.
Born out of New Zealand in 2017, it has more than 320,000 customers and $1 billion in funds under management.
Alex is one of the first Aussies to trial it starting off with an initial $150 investment. She said the no minimum amount means its perfect for the younger audience wanting to test out investing.
The easy access to the US stock market means she has purchased shares in Tesla and Microsoft — two companies she would have liked to purchase five years ago. But she is hoping cryptocurrency is added to the platform soon, as well as notifications for announcements from companies
Sharesies research found that almost half of Aussies don’t believe they have enough money to start investing and 68 per cent still depend on a saving accounts as an long-term investment strategy.
Brooke Roberts, Sharesies’ CEO and co-founder, said a lot of people still feel they need heaps of money or need to know a lot to get started with developing their wealth.
“Being able to buy any dollar amount of any company or fund on the exchange means that you can literally buy $5 or $50 of Afterpay or Xero or any other fund or company you want to invest in,” she said. “We give someone with $5 and $5 million the same investment opportunities.”
Despite almost half of Aussies believing that investing in shares is a good way to grow their money and save for retirement, only 22 per cent have bought bonds themselves.
There’s also a confidence issue as more than half of Aussies find investing confusing and 43 per cent don’t believe they’ve had sufficient financial education at school, the research found.
Ms Roberts said people up to 97 years old are on their platform, but around 70 per cent of investors are under 40 years old.
“In Australia, our research found there is a large appetite for investing for people aged 18 to 34, with 59 per cent saying they are likely to start investing in shares in the next five years,” she said.
“With Australian property prices rising at the fastest rate in 17 years, young Aussies are looking for alternate ways to invest their money and grow their wealth. Investing in shares is a great option.”
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