Hi! My name is Shirleah and I love talking about money, stocks, investments and personal finance because I believe that only by exchanging information and perspectives then we can all be more informed and seasoned investors.

I am an active investor primarily in equities – which is what most people refer to as the “stock market”. At this moment, I have approximately 70-80 % of my net worth in individual stocks, around 10% in ETF, which is an Exchange Traded Fund and the rest of it sitting in a high yield savings account as cash.

I started to invest actively and seriously when I was nearing my mid 20s, but I was not unfamiliar with the entire investing concept because I graduated from a business school for my degree in Management and Economics. I ended up getting a job in investment and financial communications where I consult for listed companies that are on several major stock exchanges, and that’s where I started talking to investors, shareholders, analysts, institutional funds, C-Level executives, and the financial media. It has been 10 years ever since and I am still in my investment communications job because I find my day job incredibly rewarding and useful in understanding both the financial markets and businesses from an investor point of view. 

However, even as somebody who’s supposedly trained to understand the capital and financial markets, I actually only started putting my own money in after 3 years being in investment communications because 1) there’s simply too many things to choose from the market 2) I was partying alot so I spend all my money on weekend fun and 3) I have an ego problem because I thought I was so smart and it just wasn’t a good time to buy stocks, which is pretty ironic because if you actually think about it, my day job essentially is to convince people to buy into a listed company. Ha! 

So if you’re like me in my mid-20s, minus that party and ego part you are thinking of entering the stock market, or have entered the market, I’m going to give you my quick tips that will allow you to start investing effectively!