Investing In The Stock Market....Isn't That Risky?

They seemed to ignore the "writing of books bit" and concentrated on the "stock market bit". One of the tradesmen showed an interest and said he was worried about the future and needed to start saving for his kids and his retirement but putting savings in the banks seemed to be a lost cause. I told him he shouldn't be putting his money in the bank. He should be buying it! The returns were better. I think he thought I was mucking around. I explained to him if he put his money in the bank he would earn about 4% on his money, but if he bought bank shares instead, he'd earn almost double that. I had his attention.

He wanted to know more about the stock market but he said he didn't have a clue. I said "no worries" and gave him a copy of The Australian Share Market Guide. He then realised what I wrote about. I said "take it home and read it and when you're finished we'll have a chat about what you can do".

A few days later he approached me and said the book was great and had a newspaper in his hand with 5 companies circled. They were Qantas, Orica, Walker Corp, Amcor and St George Bank. I thought this was interesting, he's really serious. He said to me he had read the book and did what I said and came back with a set of companies he had picked out of the paper using the selection criteria I had outlined in my book. I had a look at his selections and thought to myself he's done a good job picking these companies. At the time all the research I had on these companies had indicated they were "strong buys". I told him to go ahead and I gave him the name of my broker. He bought the shares and he's already in profit, in some cases, substantial profit.

The reason for the story? To show that anybody, from any background can get involved in the share market. You don't need to be a genius or finance wiz, you just need common sense and fundamental ground rules to work with. If someone can show you the simple rules and techniques to use in buying and selling shares you can easily make good money investing in shares.

I learnt by reading books by Warren Buffet and Benjamin Graham and by actually trading for 15 years. It's amazing what experience does for you. I have put my tried and proven methods into one easy to read and understand book, The Australian Share Market Guide. In fact, I quite often refer to it myself, to keep myself on track, and it works.

For more information on this subject, please read the following Trident Press titles:

The Australian Share Market Guide

Investing to Win