Stockin’ Up: Highlighting students who are invested in the stock market, how they got involved and what it means to them

Patiently sitting at his desk, sophomore Griffin King taps his foot as he waits for the routine buzz that comes every 15 minutes to update him on his 20 shares in Nestle stocks. Buzz. Buzz. King looks down at his watch to see if Nestle’s stock price has spiked or plummeted. Good news. They’d only gone up. 

King has been tracking these profit increases since 2019 when he opened his account under his parents account — due to legality with age. He first invested in Nestle — a nutrition, health and wellness company that engages in preparing food and medical goods — marking the start of his stock market career. King carefully watched social media posts and news outlets praising the good work the company had been doing in Africa with giving them condensed milk since the 1880s, employing locals and trying to solve poverty and HIV/AIDS. King fell in love, wanting to give back to Nestle. 

“I thought, ‘How do I support them?’” King said. “You can support them by buying Nestle products, or by Tweeting at them but what I thought of doing is [buying] some of their stock.”

King has now made over $1,000 off of an initial $40 investment. King also invested in GameStop in January of 2020, making an additional $100. 

With the market closing at 3 p.m. here, King has his own superstition of only purchasing shares after 6 p.m. The purchase doesn’t go through until the next day when it opens, giving the business more time to possibly have an increase in their stock price, proving to benefit King tremendously so far.

Although King is keeping a close eye every day on not only his Nestle stocks, but all his shares through Yahoo Finance. He does an in-depth evaluation of his investments monthly with the “stock calendar” to see which stocks are worth keeping and which to sell. 

As a part of this strategy, King withdraws money from his Nestle stock, reinvests the majority and buys Nestle products with the other remainder of his jackpot. He continues to monitor his stocks and turn profit, keeping it all at the tip of his fingers with his devices.

During the pandemic lockdown, senior Jack Rhodes quickly grew tired of spending all day at home on his phone or searching for a new show to binge watch — he wanted a better way to spend his time. He had seen all over the internet and social media that the stock market prices had dropped immensely, which spiked his interest. Then it hit him: he should take hold of the opportunity.

Always looking for a way to make a few extra bucks, the stock market stood out to Rhodes. After seeing the market all around him on the news, social media and enjoying researching businesses’ growth and numbers, this was the perfect opportunity for Rhodes. With the help of his parents, he opened up an account and began his stock market journey.

“I’ve watched movies and stuff like ‘Wolf of Wall Street,’” Rhodes said. “I feel like I’m a very numbers-oriented person. I’m really interested in that type of stuff. I’m always trying to find a new way to make extra money.”

Rhodes invested $2,000 for his first time with the hopes he would get to make easy money and fill his boredom. He invested in Moderna — which with luck was before they made the COVID-19 vaccine — as well as Apple, Tesla and some smaller companies along with a little bit of crypto-currency. 

Now having made over $8,000, Rhodes stays invested in the stock market as his own kind of side hustle. He uses an app called Robinhood to track his stocks anytime and anywhere when the stock market is open. His goal is to keep investing for years until he retires, using his stacks of money made off stocks to live lavishly.

Junior Michael Newbold grew up overhearing his parents discuss their profiting shares in businesses and constantly talk about the stock market. The talk of big businesses and their market sparked little to no curiosity in Newbold. Freshman year, Newbold took Introduction to Business and was introduced to the “Stock Market Game,” a simulation taught in the class. He finally began to grow interested, and with the help of his parents, he opened up an account under their name.

“[The game] made me think ‘That’s pretty cool, this is a pretty good life skill, I should learn [more about] this,’” Newbold said.

Prior to the class, Newbold strictly thought “green good, red bad” after seeing the stock market charts of rising and falling stock prices on National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations — an American stock exchange based in New York. However, after finally sitting down at his kitchen table and investing his own $2,000, Newbold began to dig deeper into how the market works and now watches not only those green and red lines, but more closely watches his money fluctuate throughout the day.

“It’s rewarding to just participate in it, and it’s even more rewarding when you actually make money,” Newbold said. “That incentivizes me and probably many other people to participate.”

Newbold invests in Pharma — the pharmaceutical industry — and some defense contractors and oil companies due to those being easier for him to track. Since he picked more steady companies for the most part, Newbold checks his stocks weekly or biweekly. Although, if something hits headlines he quickly checks up on his investments. 

As Newbold grew up, he watched the online stock market grow in popularity with not only the interest of adults but the interest of everyone. Now, Newbold has made at least $1,300, following in his parents footsteps.