Part 1: Start Investing While You Are Young!

It was April of 2012 when I first saw him. He was a guest on the American news parody program 'The Daily Show with Jon Stewart'. He said he was the co-founder of Paypal, and that he’d recently sold his share (180 Million USD) to help fund two new companies: Tesla and SpaceX. His name was Elon Musk.

If you have ever taken one of my classes, you know how fond I am of Elon. What he said that day on The Daily Show about sustainability and the evolution of the human condition were ideas that I shared very strongly. I thought he was a visionary and I decided that I believed in him.

I was pretty much poor at the time— a 37-year-old bachelor with minimal savings or investments. One would never have looked at my financial information and guessed that I majored in Economics and Finance during my university days. I might have had 2,000 USD to my name.

But Elon had moved me. I decided that day that I would finally begin to invest. I took 700 USD (approximately 780,000 KRW) and bought some Tesla stock.

It wasn’t much. Tesla traded at about 35.00 USD per share at the time. I bought 20 shares.

Since that day there has been a 5:1 stock split, so those 20 shares are now 100 shares. Go ahead and Google to find out how much those 100 shares are worth today.

So yeah, I love Elon Musk. I know he can be a bit of a pompous jerk on social media, and he gives weird names to his children, but he helped me change my life, and I will forever feel somehow indebted to him.

Now, I’m not writing this to boast. I’m sharing this very personal story to underline the importance and benefit of being aware of markets and economic trends and investing. And I’m telling you because you are young! You have an opportunity now! Don’t wait until you are 37 like I did.

When I was in high school in the 1990s it was Microsoft. During the early 2000s, as I was doing my MBA, it was Google and Apple. If I had invested 700 USD in either of those companies at those times, I would be a much wealthier man today.

So, here is my message to you. Invest now! 45-year-old you will appreciate it!