Stock investments
Buying a stock means buying a small piece of a company, which makes you a part-owner. As the company grows and becomes more valuable, your shares may rise in price, letting you sell for more than you paid.
A plain-language guide to stocks and cryptocurrencies: what they are, how they work and how to approach them sensibly.
We believe investing should be accessible to everyone. Whether you're looking at traditional stock markets or the newer world of cryptocurrencies, the idea is the same: putting your money to work with the goal of growing it over time.
Buying a stock means buying a small piece of a company, which makes you a part-owner. As the company grows and becomes more valuable, your shares may rise in price, letting you sell for more than you paid.
Cryptocurrency is digital money that exists online. Rather than being issued by a government, it runs on blockchain, a shared digital record book that everyone can see but no single person controls.
Think of the stock market as a marketplace where, instead of groceries, you're buying pieces of companies. "I own Apple stock" means owning a small portion of Apple itself.
Companies sell shares to raise money for their business. When you buy those shares you become a shareholder, literally owning a share of the company. If the company does well, more people may want its stock, pushing the price up. Sell when the price is higher than what you paid, and you make a profit.
It's similar to owning a house that rises in value: you don't see that extra value in your pocket until you sell. Your stock investment grows on paper until you decide to sell.
Over long periods, stocks have historically grown in value, often faster than inflation, which makes them a common way to build wealth. Some stocks also pay dividends, regular payments to shareholders from company profits.
The market can rise and fall sharply in the short term, but over many years it has generally trended upward. That's why many financial advisors include stocks in long-term plans.
Cryptocurrency is digital money that works very differently from the money in your bank account. Here's how, in simple terms.
Imagine sending money to anyone in the world within minutes, without a bank, with low fees, and without anyone being able to block the transfer. That's one of the core ideas behind cryptocurrency.
Cryptocurrencies use blockchain, a digital record book of every transaction. Instead of one company keeping that record, thousands of computers worldwide hold copies and work together to verify it, which makes the system very hard to cheat.
Bitcoin was the first cryptocurrency and is still the best known. Think of it as digital gold: rare, impossible for a government to print more of on a whim, and transferable over the internet.
It was introduced in 2008 by a person or group using the name Satoshi Nakamoto, whose real identity is unknown. Only 21 million bitcoins will ever exist. Ownership is proven with a private key, a secret password that keeps your bitcoin yours as long as you protect it.
The price could just as easily fall, reducing the value of your investment.
If Bitcoin is digital gold, Ethereum is a computer that runs on the internet. It's the second-largest cryptocurrency and does far more than move money between people.
Developers build decentralised applications (dApps) on Ethereum, from simple games to financial services that run without middlemen.
Its currency, Ether (ETH), pays for transactions and computation on the network, like fuel for a car.
Stocks and crypto can swing dramatically from day to day, which makes timing feel daunting. Here's an approach many people find helpful.
Instead of trying to guess the perfect moment to invest everything at once (nearly impossible, even for experts), invest smaller amounts regularly. Rather than $1,200 in one go, you might invest $100 every month for a year.
Sometimes you'll buy when prices are high and sometimes when they're low, but over time you pay an average price, which reduces the risk of bad timing. It works best when you're investing for years, not days.
Never invest money you can't afford to lose, especially in cryptocurrency. Both stocks and crypto carry risk. Learn as much as you can first, and consider speaking with a financial advisor about your situation.
Blockchain and digital currencies are reshaping the global economy. Our goal is to make them understandable to everyone, not just experts.
We provide educational resources and practical tools for both traditional stock markets and cryptocurrencies, and we explain complex ideas in plain language. Whether you're planning for retirement, saving for something big, or simply curious, we're here to help you learn.
Open an account when you're ready, or talk to our team first.