Stock Market Investment Series: Chapter 1 - How did I start investing in the Stock Market?

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Today is the second week of my commitment to share what I have learned about stock market investment. I started on this topic last week.

I have committed myself to this - even as far as walking you through and guiding you as you start with your own investment. It would be my honor and great pleasure to share with Bo Sanchez's mission of educating and encouraging the Filipinos to start investing. The ultimate goal of sharing my learnings and experiences is to open the minds of our younger generations of the importance of investment or passive income, in general.

I also aim to share other investment opportunities after the Stock Market Investment Series. So, I hope that you would stick with me throughout the entire series. It would help if you resteem this post so it would reach to more people.

So, how did I start investing in the stock market? Before I answer this question, let's define stock market first.

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According to Investopedia:

The stock market refers to the collection of markets and exchanges where the issuing and trading of equities (stocks of publicly held companies), bonds and other sorts of securities takes place, either through formal exchanges or over-the-counter markets.

In plain explanation, some companies publicly offer their stocks to anyone who are interested at buying. The company does this to fund the expansion of their business, or basically for the company's growth. The company sets the Initial Public Offering (IPO) during the first time that they offer the stocks to the public. The prices could fluctuate depending on several factors including the company's business performance. The selling and buying of stocks, also known as trading, is guided by the Philippine Stock Exchange, Inc (PSE). It is a private non-profit and non-stock organization which was created to provide and maintain a fair, efficient, transparent and orderly market for the purchase and sale of stocks and other securities.

Now, let me share how I started investing. I have been hearing about stock market investing back in 2012. But I was so ignorant about it. It did not leave a good impression on me because I did not understand it. I was stuck in the idea of becoming a traditional investor or entrepreneur. Owning a business establishment was my only goal.

The first business franchise failure I experienced in 2012 broke my heart. I was discouraged.

Until someone influenced me back in 2014 to invest in stocks. He was so eager to start investing and he wanted me to share in his visions. So, I did.

It was, probably, an impulse. It wasn't, possibly, carefully thought of (this doesn't leave a good taste in the mouth, I know). But, I believe there are no accidents and impulses. I know now that it's the result of my great desire to really invest.

I agreed to invest in that same year and he chose the broker to which we started our investments with.

Investopedia definition: A broker is an individual or firm that charges a fee or commission for executing buy and sell orders submitted by an investor.

We have an online broker which allows us to choose companies and buy and sell stocks on our own as opposed to banking institutions where you invest your money and the broker gets to decide where they put your money into. You just have to wait for the harvesting time.

I tried to understand my new venture from the ideas he used to feed me. My first stocks were from MBT (Metrobank's stock code) and TEL (telco PLDT's stock code). I earned my first profit from selling TEL when its market price went high. I was thrilled. It triggered my mind to learn more about the trading.

That was when I started reading and listening to tutorials and discussions about stocks trading. However, the beginning of the journey wasn't a walk in the park at all.

I invested in a company which later on declared bankruptcy and sold the company to a corporation which does not want to publicly share the stocks. It was my first learning experience - to research about the company first.

So, I make sure now that, whenever I would be interested at buying stocks from a certain company, I have enough knowledge about the company and a little about their history.

It also helped when I followed Bloomberg Philippines. I got some guidance about which company to invest in and still continuously gets some suggestions from them.

In the next chapter, Stock Market Investment Series: Chapter 2 - How did I prepare myself to start investing in the Stock Market?, I will talk about the platforms and sources of my knowledge about stock market investment.

I hope you will stick with me in this journey.