Get Rich Quick!

I have a group chat with my beer league hockey team. We chat about everything from hockey to things I will not share on this blog.

The interesting topic that came up the other day was about selling 1000 shares of Disney stock to invest in Bitcoin. Some of the guys were like “do it” and two of us were against it.

I’ll make the case for why the minority in the group was correct.

Details:

Individual was fortunate enough to be gifted 1000 shares of Disney stock.

Currently trading at just over 100 a share.

Individual admitted he knows zero about stocks and investing. Red flag.

1000 shares is a about 100k before fees, taxes, etc if sold.

Unknowns:

Restrictions on stocks. I did ask him to find out.

Knowns:

Individual has no debt.

Individual is not maxing out tax deferred accounts.

Individual does not have 6-12 month emergency fund.

Individual has zero knowledge of investing but is eager to learn.

Advice:

My view is if you don’t have your tax deferred accounts maxed out and don’t understand where your money is going within those accounts, you can’t logically make the case to trade 1000 share of Disney stock for overvalued and overhyped Bitcoin.

Bitcoin Success Stories:

Media likes to hype on the lucky few who made millions off of Bitcoin. What about the thousands of people who blindly sunk their life savings into it and lost.

Individual’s Path Forward:

He may sell and buy Bitcoin. Who knows. But between myself and another team member, we laid out the case why he shouldn’t. Disney pays a nice a dividend. I said reinvest those dividends and increase your shares. Disney has been around a long time and isn’t going anywhere. Besides, it was a gift. If it drops to 80.00 a share, he still didn’t lose.

Actively participating in your own 401k and researching the funds is a start. We all have to start somewhere and if you have a tax deferred account options, that’s a great resource. You can call them ten times a day and get free advice and gain knowledge.

Read, read, read. I don’t know why we will read pointless Facebook posts 6 hours a day but we won’t read up on investing, economics, and the market.

Stay away from glorified fads. If you’re reading about a hot stock on main stream news, sorry but that ship has sailed. And most likely was a risky gamble.

Get rich quick is terrible idea.