Investing in Experiences: Online Stock Trading Seminar

Last Monday, I attended the Online Stock Trading Seminar of the DLSU-D JFINEX. It's their annual stock trading seminar which aims to encourage students to create their on online stock accounts and start investing early. For 2 years, COL Financial has been their partner in spreading financial literacy and letting the community know that investing in stocks are not only for the rich and wealthy but for every Filipino! COL also set up a booth where student are inquire and fill up account forms.

Mr. Jed Velarde, a training consultant from COL Financial, was invited to talk this year. I really enjoyed listening to him and he gave us a lot of tips on how we should perceive the market and look at it from a long term perspective. He gave a lot of stories and analogies that were simple yet effective that both students and professors understood and related upon like comparing the amount of groceries you can buy then and now to explain inflation. He is such an engaging speaker and was able to even make students laugh at some of his jokes. 

I learned 3 important things from Mr. Velarde which are:

Be an Investor - Mr. Jed encouraged us to think of ourselves as investors in the stock market and not traders. Traders are usually does person who closely watch the market and day trade which is to buy and sell a stock on the same and gain profit through  share price appreciation. He told us that it would that, although there is nothing wrong with being a trader, it entails a lot of risks and as students who wish to maximize the growth potential of our portfolio we have yet to afford such risks. He recommend being an investor instead where you can continuously invest in the market.

Invest for the Long Term - We should also invest in the market with a long horizon in mind. The market is constantly changing however, in the end, its trend will always go up especially in a developing country like the Philippines which still has so much potential to grow moving forward. Which is why if you are going to invest now, keep in mind that you will doing so for the next 30 to 40 years into the future.

Do it Regularly - Invest in the market regularly. Mr. Velarde suggests monthly, quarterly or maybe semiannually and make sure to invest in stocks with good fundamental which will certainly continue to grow and be more profitable in the future. The trick to this strategy is to continue investing even if the market if high or low. COL Financial  believes that thru peso cost averaging you will be able to create a sizeable portfolio with low cost stocks especially in the long term and you may do this as well through their EIP.

So if you are a student and you are interested in creating your own stock account you may do so thru COL Financial starting with 5000PHP. Here's what you'll need to open one. I hope you'll find it helpful and see you in the next post! 

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored or anything of that sort. Also credits to the DLSU-D JFINEX for the posters and guidelines on the COL account requirements.

Student Leader Chronicles: Interview with 95.9 Green FM

Being a student leader has brought a lot of challenge but it has showered upon me countless of blessing and opportunities as well! One of those is to be invited as a guest in the Lingkod Lasalyano program of our universities radio station, 95.9 Green FM. 

Lingkod Lasalyano is a radio talk show program in our university which highlights key projects and activites made or are being held by the Lasallian youth. Last Friday, they featured the Council of Student Organizations' upcoming event which is Enviweek 2016: The Lasallian Youth in Action for Environmental Conservation this November 14-19, 2016. This will be a week long event focusing on the environmental advocacies and how the youth can start making a difference in our environment.

Chelsea, my co-projecthead (right) and I (left), were both awestruck and flattered that Green FM chose our activity as their  feature. We were a bit nervous because it was our first time to be interviewed live but Mangie, the Lingkod Lasalyano host and her team guided us all through out. 

Being invited in this kinds of appearances really bring joy to me as a student leader -- that I will be able to reach out to be fellow youth and encourage them to make a difference in their lives and to our community. We really hope that our event will be able to make an impact in the lives of students and the opportunity to talk about Enviweek on air gave us more drive to push even further!

That's all for now. I will be post more about our event in the coming weeks. Cheers!

The Investing Perspective: How I Budget My Allowance?

I apologize for the temporary haitus for this blog. University life has basically eaten up almost all of my free time. But I'm glad to be back! Today, I want to talk about something I've been doing for the past month in order to help me stay on budget. I have tried a lot of methods to keep track on what I spend but I just couldn't commit to any until this one.

As a typical college student, it really vital for me to monitor my allowance because of I don't, I wont be able to eat the next day. And since, I'm a student leader, I'm very active and I usually join events and competitions. These are a few of the reasons why I created a system for my to budget my allowance.Basically, I made this budgeting system using Google Sheets, which I really find convenient. I can easy edit my template on my laptop using my google account; or my phone using the Sheets App. 

The formula I use is very straightforward. It's my take on the concept of Income - Savings = Expenses. My savings are my deposits to my stock account since I still don't have a job and really want to take advantage of investing early in the stock market, I put a portion of my allowance to my investment.  But I also deduct one time expenses that I foresee to happen in that coming month. For example, I know that I will have to pay membership fees last September so I made sure to deduct it on my spendable allowance beforehand. I really love the fact that Conditional Formatting is available in Google Sheets as well and it really help to condition my mind to save even further.

I also included the one-time expenses I failed to budget on (red mark) so that I can have a better view of the things I did not take account for so that I can avoid it in the future.

After getting the Spendable allowance, I would divide it by 4 weeks and further divide it by 6 days which are my normal school days in a week to get my spendable allowance per day. However I also add the Total Variance to that which is equal to the maximum I can spend in a day. The variance may be a surplus of deficit depending on by much I saved out of the allowances on the previous days.




If you want to try using this template I have uploaded a sample here as well, feel free to download it. The Investing POV: Monthly Budget Allowance

How about you? How do you budget your allowance? Comment them down below.

Disclaimer: The formula is something I created for myself, it may vary from one person to another!

Student Leader Chronicles: The Grand University Recruitment Week

A few weeks ago, the Council of Student Organization and the University Student Council organized The Grand University Recruitment Week participated by the different Recognized Student Organization, Auxiliary groups, Performing Arts Group and Political parties DLSU-D. This event was held in our university's lake park.

 It was a fun-filled for the students and student leaders alike as they showcase their respective organizations. The event started of with a grand parade around the university proper. Although the participants were considerably fewer, we were happy that students from the Senior High Department and their professors watched as we passed their side of the campus. The rest of the day was spent on decorating the booths and recruiting new members.

This  year in particular, a lot of the organizations took advantage of social media by publicizing posters and updates about their booths in platforms like Facebook and Twitter. A lot of organization also gave away free food for new/old registered members. Here a few examples from DLSU-D Lifters, a religious student organization. They chose the give away bread as was often told in the Bible! I like how they related the nature of their organization to the concept of the recruitment strategy. The other post is from the Lasallian First Aiders - Red Cross Youth, an interest organization which in my understading is widely patronized by med students (atleast in our university, but anyone interest may join)

In the end the event wasn't perfect but no event every is! What's important is that the organization was able to expose themselves to the students and a lot of new members were recruited! this is a good way to find and train new student leaders who will one day become the officers of their respective organizaion!

Disclaimer: This post is not sponsored. Credits  to DLSU-D Heraldo Filipino, Lifters, LSFA-RCY and CSO for the photos!