Teen Ink

I owe my start in the financial world to my wise great-great-aunt Lil. When we visited her in Arizona one summer, she gave my brothers and me shares of stock in a company. Because of this, I began to teach myself about stocks and finance through the Internet.

I learned everything I could about trading, and I eventually proved to my dad that I was capable of playing the market with real money. And I was very successful at it. When my dad saw how well I was doing, he even let me manage his retirement savings. I currently manage his, mine, and my brothers’ money.

This was all wonderful, but I wanted to give back, so I started a blog talking about whatever was happening in the market. Then I had the idea of launching TeenStockTrader.com. It proved to be a lot of work to set up, but I never gave up, and eventually I found two business partners: a fellow teen stock trader and an older man who became our programmer. The Internet was my medium for giving back to the community and helping young people take charge of their financial futures as early as possible.

The business and financial world is one that I am happy to have found, as I knew nothing about it as a child. I have surely used my knowledge to my advantage. My experience in the financial world has prepared me well for working full time, since the only way you can prepare yourself for something is by actually doing it.

Sadly, my aunt passed away before I told her what she had done for me. But her inspiration has made me a better, more focused investor who can get the job done no matter what the circumstances.