Dear—my soon to be—she-wolves of Wall Street

Dear—my soon to be—she-wolves of Wall Street,

I love you guys, but I’m tired of the excuses.

“Stocks are too complicated.”

“Trading makes no sense.”

“How am I supposed to know what to invest in?”

I mean come on. You girls are so incredibly smart in a million different ways. A few of you are majoring in biochemistry and neuroscience. Some of y’all are working towards becoming lawyers and aeronautical engineers. So why on earth is the world of stocks too complicated for you?

Realistically—it actually isn’t—you're just not trying hard enough. Sorry to sound harsh but if random kids on the internet can become millionaires overnight, so can my girls. Now, I get why you guys are so scared to dip your toes into the pool. It can be uncertain. It can be volatile. Most importantly though, a lot of you have been taught to “leave it to the guys”. I mean how many times have you heard the phrases: “It’s too complicated, you won’t understand” or “Give me your money, I’ll invest it for you”. So many men—well not all of course, but a lot—gate keep the stock market from us. They wanna stay in control, stay on top. Unfortunately—because of this—you, my dear friends, have been shoved out of the loop and forced down a deep hole of confusion and ignorance. There is so much money to be made and you’re missing out. But, never fear because Ayla is here. I’m gonna pull you girls out of that hole. Enough depending on men; it’s time to learn from a lady.

I wanna start by saying the hardest part is honestly starting. I understand that you’re all “girl bosses” who have school to focus on but, it truly only takes maybe one day of research to change your life. So do it. Take one day out of your schedule and spend it researching how the stock market functions and what definitions are important for you to understand. I recommend Youtube as a way to ease into it. Here are a few videos I started with:

-”How does the stock market work” by TEDed: a simple infographic that breaks down how the stock market works, obviously.

-Brandon Beavis Investing: a wonderful creator that explains the different types of investing accounts. Make sure to watch the ones where he explains what a TFSA and RRSP are.

-”Stock Market Terminology for Dummies” by Valuetainment Economic: a 13 minute video breaking down those words we always hear but never understand; plus they’re in alphabetical order.

These videos will clear so many foggy windows and—if you’re like me—fuse connections you didn’t even know were there. I swear they are so easy to comprehend that you’ll be left wondering why you didn’t do this earlier.

Now, after you’ve gotten the gist of how this stuff works, start. Literally just start. Go on your phone right now and download the trading app of your choice; I prefer WealthSimple. It’s a great beginners app. You can open up your TFSA and connect your bank accounts; this way deposits between your bank and TFSA will be smooth and fast. The best part about stocks is that you can start trading with as little as $1. This is called fractional trading: instead of buying a whole stock—you’ll learn what a stock is from watching the vocab video—you can buy a “fraction” of one. Using whatever money you have, the app will calculate the amount of stock available for you. This means you can really just keep buying stocks every now and then, eventually building up your TFSA to thousands of dollars—all tax free!

This brings me to my next point. For the love of god, please stop spending your money on useless things. You have enough clothes, you girls are killing your bank accounts—and the earth—with your overconsumption of fast fashion. Enough! Instead of spending your dollars on Shein and Zaful, just save them. Invest them instead. Overtime, saving this money along with investing will—in the long run—potentially make you a millionaire. I mean, come one now. If you weigh the results, is that flimsy crop top really worth it? You could buy a nice shiny car in 15 years instead. Long term gains should always override the short term ones.

Here’s another tip that goes along with the whole long term mindset. You always hear horror stories of people losing thousands of dollars in the stock market right? Maybe that's part of the reason as to why you’re so scared to start in the first place. Well guess what? We can avoid that. These people messed up; they put way too much money in all at one time. On top of that, this money was important to them. They probably spend years collecting and saving it. Those people are chumps though; they weren’t thinking clearly. I suggest that all the money you invest should be “pocket change”. This money should not be extremely important to you, it should be cash that won’t hurt you if you happen to lose it. Over time, when you collect enough of this “pocket change” it’ll eventually turn into “house buying change”. Always remember, even though the stock market can make you rich, it can—just as easily—make you poor. That being said, losing $5000 hurts way more than losing $10.

Do not—I repeat—DO NOT trust someone else to invest your money for you. You girls are so incredibly smart and capable, it’s almost immoral to disregard that by letting someone else touch your dollars. Your money is your money. Have you ever seen the movie Wolf Of Wallstreet? If you haven’t, watching it is part of your homework now. That movie is perfect at depicting why no one else should handle your money. Do your own research when it comes to investing. Don’t blindly follow flashy headlines over biased articles. Be smart and think critically; try to see the long term. For example, we know that our societal dependence on oil and gas is causing the earth to heat up at an exponential rate. Whether we like it or not—to keep ourselves alive—we will eventually need to move towards renewable green energy. So, the smart move would be to invest into companies that plan to double their solar panel production rather than ones that are hanging on to their last bucket of oil.

A wonderful idea—in my opinion—would be to start a group chat with some close friends. Name it something fun like “Stock Queens” or “Women in Finance”. Use this group chat to talk to each other about different companies you’re considering investing into. Bounce ideas off of each other and help one another out. One thing I hate about the stock community is how selfish people can be. No one wants to talk about their investments because they want to be the richest. Like I previously mentioned, people gate keep. Us girls though, we aren’t going to do that. There’s enough abundance for all of us, enough cash and cars. Helping each other out can only benefit us more.

Sure, the world of stocks can be tricky. There’s a lot of graphs, big numbers, and weird words. Sometimes you can lose money and feel demotivated. Other times, the exact opposite will occur instead. It might seem small now. It might seem annoying and tedious but I promise you this: once you start, you won’t regret a thing. Think 20 years from now. If you were smart about your investments—and took my advice—you could be relaxing in your backyard pool with a martini in one hand and the newest iPhone in your other. All this can be at the tip of your fingers just because you started young and worked your way up. I don’t care if you’re planning on being a doctor or a housewife; having your own money is essential. Financial freedom is exactly what it says it is; it's freeing. Being able to live the life you desire without having to worry about funds is a feeling nobody can take from you once it's in your possession.

With love and hope,

Ayla Ahmed