Table of contents

My most lucrative hobby

Another one of my hobbies – and this one (likely) more lucrative, as opposed to the more ordinary hobbies that normally only bring us satisfaction but no cash – is stock market investing.

My favorite type of investment

Currently, my entire investing strategy focuses on single stocks rather than the “trendy investments” of today, like cryptos and the like. It doesn’t mean I have anything against those types of investments, but I haven’t made a great deal of effort yet to even try to deeply understand them. This may change tomorrow, but by now I prefer to focus my attention on what I can truly enjoy, can already understand (to a better or worse degree), and that’s been delivering quite satisfactory results so far.

Becoming a stock market investor

My undermining paradigms

But it wasn’t always like that, even as far as my now-so-beloved stock market is concerned. Before 2015 (when I was already 35), several unfounded paradigms inhabiting my head prevented me from starting investing way sooner, something I severely regret nowadays, as I’m sure my current financial situation would be infinitely better. Just like a large portion of the population, I was then wrongly convinced that “it was necessary to be somehow rich already, start with a large sum of money, and be a financial expert to start investing in the stock market”, otherwise, taking a first step in that direction wouldn’t even be worthy.

The paradigm shift

However, I believe it was my reading of Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki – yeah, I know the guy is kinda shady (to put it veeeery lightly), but it doesn’t mean the book doesn’t contain some great fundamental principles about finances, especially the first chapter – earlier in that year that helped me destroying such paradigms.

My first-ever investment

After spending that Summer learning the very basics of stock market investing (the type of investment that seemed the most enticing to me, a standpoint that I maintain a decade later), I had to borrow money from my grandmother – at the time, I was facing tough times and was literally broke –, opened an online broker account, and bought my first stock ever (5 shares of $DIS, if you’re curious).

A perpetual investor-in-training

It would nevertheless be a mistake to consider that “I’ve been investing in the stock market since 2015”. In fact, I made a few mistakes in those first 4 years (namely choosing my online broker very poorly, which was eating me more money in fees and whatnot than the revenue I was making with my stocks), not to mention that I had close to zero cash to invest anyway during those dark days, so I wasn’t even particularly active to begin with.

Becoming an active investor

In early 2019, when I discovered there was that thing called “discount brokers” with way lower fees (and when my financial situation was finally starting to show signs of improvement), I switched to my current broker and began investing in a quite more active manner, frequently monitoring my portfolio, searching for potentially interesting stocks, and investing a great chunk of my income whenever possible.

Becoming a value investor

I’m not a “trader” at all, nor do I intend to be. I’d classify myself as a so-called “value investor”. My portfolio mainly consists of what I consider to be “value stocks” (i.e., bargains from established companies with a great intrinsic value) mixed with “growth stocks” (quality companies with potential to greatly grow throughout the years) and “income stocks” (companies that pay a reasonable quarterly/monthly dividend, have been doing so for years and years, and have a tendency to keep increasing it). This is the strategy that has been working for me, and therefore the one I like to recommend.

Interested in knowing more?

This page contains just a summary of how this hobby is a part of my life. If you’re curious to read more about my life journey (where this hobby and a few others get covered in more detail when appropriate, always UNCENSORED and UNFILTERED, unlike in some other platforms), you should consider subscribing to my 100% FREE weekly newsletter! 👇