Still thinking that you will start investing from next month? Next week even. Let’s just wait for that birthday money to get credited from mom and dad, then you can start. This is not an article that will preach the benefits of starting your investing journey real early, albeit, there are several to talk about. Instead, I’m going to show you that there is no excuse not to start as early as you can.
The truth is that you will figure out the benefits only with experience. Reading about them helps in understanding but not in taking action. To take action, you need to know that it’s simple, quick and no reason not to.
Without further ado – here it is: the three reasons why you have no excuse not to start investing today.
1. Small lots
Whether you are investing in equities, cryptocurrencies, NFTs or gold. Technology has enabled all of us to start investing with pocket change. With as little as Rs 500, you can start investing in equity stocks and mutual funds, which means you can even buy paper gold in the form of gold exchange-traded funds for this small amount. For cryptocurrencies, it’s even better; you don’t need to buy a minimum of 1 unit of crypto, you can buy it in fractions and some crypto exchanges will allow transaction sizes as low as Rs 100. This means you can own 0.000000001 units of a cryptocurrency, the point is that you have started investing.
2. Quick and easy
There are apps for everything, which can be downloaded on your phone for you to start investing. It takes 10-15 mins tops to start your trading account on exchanges through a number of good quality brokers and exchanges. What you need is ID proof, bank details and an address proof – boom! You can start investing in under half an hour. While waiting for your friend to arrive or for your hair appointment, just go ahead and do it. Investing in mutual funds is also as simple.
3. Time can make you millions
That’s right. No matter what the risk asset, it will never give you returns in a straight line. We knew that about equities and gold, young investors are discovering that about crypto. You cannot hope that the price will keep going up every day, there will be down days and even months or years. The sooner you start investing, the lesser they will matter. At the moment, this Rs 500 or Rs 1000 that you are going to invest is not critical for you, so you invest and forget. Tomorrow the value may be Rs 495 or Rs 505 or anything else and the day after it may be Rs 490 or Rs 520 or anything else. Over time, gains compound where there is a fundamental value in the underlying business or proposition and this will what will create wealth for you. Your Rs 500 can become Rs 30,000 in 10 years if you invest in the equity market indices. The time taken can be a year or two or ten for your chosen investmentAn investment is made to give you a return. You make an investment if you use your money to buy either physical assets like property or financial assets like bonds and equity with an aim to receive income or gains... More, you will know this only when you begin now.
Just like with anything else in life, in investing too, you are bound to make mistakes. The earlier you start the more valuable your learnings from these mistakes will be by the time you become a mature investor. Finish off investing in worthless cryptocurrencies or penny stocks by the time you are 25 years old, so that your fundamentally solid wealth creation, with good quality assets, can start with minimum mistakes before you turn 30. This is an advantage over the rest of the world.
Truth is, creating sustainable passive income through investing early in life can give you an edge to choose what you want to do with life, the moment you realise that you want something different. Truth is, money enables certain freedom in choice and the key is that you should be the owner of that money. Imagine if, at the prime of your life, you decide you don’t want to do that business your dad left you or the job you are so well qualified for or the start-up you passionately worked on, you want something different. The ability and freedom to make this choice will be championed by those many coffees you gave up in your early 20s to start meaningful investing.
All you need to do is stop making excuses because there are none and start investing.
Small amounts – invested quickly, big mistakes – fixed early, these are the experiences you pocket now without giving up much and these are the experiences that will set your life apart 10-20 years later when all this time is already behind you.
Get started. There are no excuses not to.