I keep getting questions like: "must I
bother myself to learn how to invest? Shouldn’t I rather focus on just managing
my monthly income?" My answer to such questions is simple, you definitely have to learn how to invest for
a number of reasons. Below are just three (3) of them:
Reason 1: If you
don’t, other people will use your money to enrich themselves and pay you
nothing for it (in fact, they will even charge you for “keeping” it for you).
Don’t get me wrong, I have absolutely nothing against the banking industry. In
fact, I have a number of cherished friends who are bankers however the truth is
that I do not advise keeping “excess money” in a bank account. I sure do have
bank accounts but, I just keep emergency funds there. Any idle funds I get,
goes straight into an investment account. Why will I watch the banks enrich
themselves by trading with my money and not do the same for myself?
Reason 2: If you
don’t invest, inflation will “eat up” your money! It is an uncontestable fact
that the prices of goods and services are always on an upward march. An amount
of GHC100.00 today will most certainly buy less than it could have bought 12
months ago. The lesson: Prices generally
keep going up so, you also have to “grow” your money or watch it dwindle in
value.
Reason 3: For
those who are Christians, Jesus advised that we should invest. In one of the
most interesting stories in the Bible found in Matthew 25:14-30, Jesus establish
the principle that seeking interest on your money should be a way of life. He
said, “…you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when
I return, I would have received it back with interest.” This shows that God
endorses investment as a legitimate means of making money.
By: M.D. Avor
No comments:
Post a Comment