Course link: Stock Market Investing for Beginners

(So actually, I was looking for some online courses on Technical Writing, but then I stumbled upon this Udemy course about stock investing. Since it’s still ongoing, I thought, why not just “settle” this course first? LOL.)

Since I started earning an income, I’ve had a habit of investing. Nothing too complicated lah, just take part of my salary and buy some stocks, ETFs, and other financial products. But to be honest, my investment strategy got no plan one. Like, I buy stocks depending on my mood. If I see a stock being like everybody talking about it, then I just buy a few shares. If I make money, good good lor. If not, no choice lor.

One time, I asked a friend of mine who started investing earlier than me. He said, before buying stocks, can read the company’s quarterly Financial Statements to see how they are doing, and then decide if it’s worth investing or not.

I totally agree with him—numbers don’t lie, right? That’s the most objective way to check. So I went to look at them. Wah, I didn’t understand anything.

That’s why when I saw this course’s chapter on [Reading a Financial Statement], it caught my attention immediately.

The course starts with the basics of what a stock is, explaining the nature and types: common stock, preferred stock, and so on. Then it went into concepts like how stock prices reflect a company’s market cap, industry sector, and whether it’s cyclical or non-cyclical. For me, all these concepts were quite new. The course also briefly explained what affects stock prices: supply and demand, institutional investors (who affect trading volume), company financials, and even investor sentiment. Now, for some of this knowledge, acutally you can figure out on your own through experience lah(i feel).

But what I found really interesting were the terms like IPO (Initial Public Offerings). Before this, I didn’t know the difference between an “IPO” and being “listed” on the stock market. Thanks to this course, I learned about the primary market and the secondary market.

The Primary Market is where IPOs happen. When a company goes for an IPO, the shares are first sold in the primary market, with investment banks setting the initial price. The buyers here are usually big players like funds, insurance companies, investment banks, VCs, or if you personally got the capital to join an IPO (then maybe you can join also?).

The Secondary Market is where stocks get traded after the IPO. Stocks will be listed on exchanges like NASDAQ, NYSE, etc. This is where most retail investors, like us, buy and sell.

(TBC)