Mutual Fun(d): Student investors share their experiences with stocks and cryptocurrency

Griffin King:

Freshman Griffin King started his investment career by offhandedly purchasing a few shares of GameStop stock after the infamous post was made on the Reddit page “r/wallstreetbets” — a decision that would make him $600 richer. 

Unlike the thousands of others who bought this stock to offset market manipulation by the ultra-wealthy, King said that he was primarily motivated by the potential payout.

“I couldn’t care less about the political aspect of it,” King said. “I just want to get make money [off of this] and it looks like a good opportunity to make money. And I feel like that might be kind of the mindset you have to have if you’re going to invest in stocks. You have to be a predator.”

Even though King didn’t choose to invest in GameStop to show solidarity for the movement, he believes that the whole situation does a good job at exposing the injustices going on in Wall Street.

“I think it’s pretty well known, but the stock market is so insanely rigged,” King said. “If you want to be a retail investor in the stock market you’re just screwed. [There’s] just straight up market manipulation going on from people who have, in the past, actually admitted to market manipulation using giant, hidden hedge funds and working together. Overall, just doing things that are illegal.”

Due to the spontaneous and volatile nature of the GameStop situation, King believes that this investment will be the first and last stock he’ll buy in his life, despite the massive payout he received.

“GameStop was like a once in a lifetime thing — stocks don’t generally go up like 20,000% in six months,” said King. “I mean, if you’re gonna invest something you probably want to buy just like a really stable stock like Apple or Google or ABC or whatever because you’re not going to like buying super risky stocks.”

Jack Rhodes:

While many students spent their time in quarantine making cloud bread and cleaning their closets, junior Jack Rhodes filled the endless hours checking his stocks app for the fluctuating prices of his various holdings.

“I started really getting into it when the whole pandemic hit,” Rhodes said. “I knew that if I could buy stocks in cruise lines and airlines at a record low price then I would make a ton of money in the long run when these businesses started opening up again.”

When he started investing, Rhodes made his decisions based on intuition and impulse. Now, his decisions are more based on analyzing price-to-earnings ratios rather than a gut feeling.

“I used to just invest in whatever I thought would be a good stock to buy,” Rhodes said. “Now I actually take the time to look up different ratios and statistics related to which stock I am considering purchasing.”

Although it’s ultimately his investment decisions that led him to make these profits, Rhodes doesn’t solely claim credit for his success. He says that he regularly talks with his neighbor, a financial advisor, to discuss which stocks or funds he should invest in. 

“I recommend that you do your research and talk to a friend or family member who has some experience in investing,” Rhodes said. “It really does makes a difference.”

Edward Sih:

His friends, neighbors and even his personalized TikTok For You page were telling him to put money into cryptocurrency. Sophomore Edward Sih didn’t realize this investment would accrue him upwards of a few thousand dollars.

However, these earnings didn’t come without effort. Sih recommends that anyone who wants to invest in cryptocurrency does thorough research into whatever they want to buy. He also adds that many people are simply buying cryptocurrencies because of the growing popularity.

“I would just probably say that before you look into getting into a certain coin, look at the value into why it’s the price it is,” Sih said. “I know ones like Dogecoin, the reason why it’s so popular is because a lot of people want to own cryptocurrency just to say they own it. And since it’s so cheap, that’s the one they go to.”

Specifically, Sih says that he gets most of his investment knowledge from watching YouTube channels like AltCoin Daily, BitBoy Crypto, Crypto Face and Crypto Jebb.

Overall, he always leaves potential first-time investors with the advice to be as careful and educated about investing as you can be. Sih receives Cryptocurrency newsletters and has subscribed to YouTubers giving advice, always expanding his knowledge of the market.

“[Investment in general] is just super risky,” Sih said. “It is so volatile, but as more institutional money is being put into cryptocurrency, it becomes increasingly less volatile. If you’re thinking of investing in cryptocurrency, just try to read up on as much as you can.”