About Us
Hi, my name is Mark and I created Stock Market College. I’m a successful stock market investor and Analyst/Programmer. My work as a programmer in the business world lead to an interest in investing. Programming is what I do, but investing is my passion. I take investing very seriously. I won’t be depending on a pension when I retire. I want to retire financially independent and the stock market is my weapon of choice when it comes to building wealth. When I first started investing in the late 1990s, I took what I considered the “safe route” by investing in managed funds. They were okay, but in my best year I only managed to achieve an 8% annual return. I was expecting the returns to be closer to the stock market average which is about 11% per year over extended time periods. Disillusioned with the whole managed fund thing, I decided to educate myself in the ways of famous investors such as Warren Buffett, Benjamin Graham, Peter Lynch, Jesse Livermore, and William O’Neil. After reading a lot of books (more than 50), and taking a course at the Australian Stock Exchange, I felt confident enough to start buying individual shares on my own. That was about 10 years ago, and I can say in all honesty, it’s the best thing I ever did financially. I decided to start out small. I invested $3,000 in one company. Saved another $3,000. Then invested that in another company. Before long I had a $15,000 share portfolio with 5 companies in it. My initial investment of $3,000 grew to $92,000 in less than 4 years. I would top up my share portfolio with a little of my savings every now again and I believe this is one of the secrets to growing your money. If you like, you can use the Investment Results Calculator to run some scenarios with different amounts in the “Annual Savings Added” field to see for yourself. You’ll see how a little extra money added to your share portfolio each year can make a big difference to the results you receive after 5 and 10 year periods. I hope that you find Stock Market College to be a useful resource in your quest for investment success. Best wishes Mark |