<p>I am a pretty young guy, but I am very thrifty. I only have the bare essentials going and my only indulgence would be food, but even then its all home cooked because it is way cheaper. The result of all of this is I have about 10,000 dollars saved and I am interested in learning how to invest in the stock market, as well as other things like gold and all of that. I am not sure where to start, and its going to take me 2 weeks just to get an appointment with my schools counseler to find out what courses I could take there in order to learn this.</p>
<p>So I guess my options are getting a good book(s) or taking some essential classes. Signing up for fall starts in one week, so I kind of want to fit one or 2 in if I can. Does anyone have any recommendations? As a side note, I am a pure math major now, dropped CS, but still plan to take some of the core classes that global and ucbalum recommend. If there are some good courses or even just the textbooks I would love to hear what you have!</p>
<p>Economics/Finance Courses</p>
<p>There are huge numbers of books for the ordinary investor that you should be able to find in any library. (However, it would be best to look at several of them since authors do disagree to some extent.)</p>
<p>If you are interested in a more formal and theoretical treatment, consider the finance courses in your school’s economics and business departments, or reading the textbooks and course materials for those courses (for example, Berkeley [Economics</a> 136](<a href=“http://www.econ.berkeley.edu/~szeidl/ec136/ec136index.htm]Economics”>http://www.econ.berkeley.edu/~szeidl/ec136/ec136index.htm) or [Economics</a> 138](<a href=“http://emlab.berkeley.edu/users/webfac/malmendier/e138_s08/e138.shtml]Economics”>Econ 138, Financial and Behavioral Economics)). Since you are a math major, you may find the courses with the most math to be the most worthwhile.</p>
<p>@ucbalum</p>
<p>A little bit of both, I will swing for the econ courses and see if I cannot snag those ordinary books as well, so I can understand the theory as well as some common methods of investing via books.</p>
<p>Start with a mutual fund. They can give you a diverse portfolio without you having to spend a huge amount of money. 10,000 really isn’t a lot and you’ll have to pay a lot of fees on transactions if you invest directly into stocks. Go with a mutual fund like Vanguard through a Roth IRA where all the profit you make will be tax free.</p>
<p>Actually i would just go to the business department and grab an old tenured prof who seems nice, ask him if he knows of anyone who teaches a course about investing. 9 times out of 10 he will or will point you in the direction of someone who does. </p>
<p>Remember that many of the profs in business school know very little about investing. If your school has a entrepreneur major, your best bet might be to talk to the profs in these departments. If none of the above works, there are usually student groups that focus on investing. I accidently ran into one my sophomore year in college by going to the wrong meeting room in the library, I learned quite a bit. Most importantly i learned what profs to take that knew a little about investing.</p>
<p>For the stock market. Read The intelligent investor by Ben Gram. You have to understand it is a process. Do not intend to make millions a year with 10K to start. Invest defensively. A 40% loss does not equal a 40% gain. Losses kill you. Gram covers bonds, common and preferred stocks, ect. Small companies are risky but can double fast. Little things like when a president such as the Apple guy resigns BUY and then SELL when prices go back up. Buy LOW Sell HIGH. Message me with any details. My father has poured into mover the years. Personally that 10k would be a nice rental especially with low interest rates and values now.</p>
