The First Trade
Seven years ago, I put $1000 of hard-earned summer money into the NASDAQ index, QQQ (now called QQQQ). For the next few weeks, I lived and breathed the market as I watched my ticker go up and down every chance I had. I’d sneak peaks in between classes. Green meant that the world revolved around me while red put me into the dumps. As a ninth grader, the news replaced cartoons as I found a new way to look at the world. I saw money everywhere…and I wanted in on the secret.
After the first month, however, I realized that I was so emotionally drained that I couldn’t keep it up anymore. Besides, I was in the buy and hold camp at the time, and decided that ticker watching was a waste of my time and energy if I wasn’t going to make any trades. So I stayed on the sidelines, checking in every week or two, as I watched my money grow. By the time I sold QQQ a year later with a tidy profit, I was caught in the market’s webs.