Students are Investing in Their Futures by Putting Money into ‘Crypto’ and Stocks

Andy Choi, Staff Writer

Gas, food, rent: you name it. Prices are going up, up, up. 

When the COVID-19 pandemic began in March of 2020, governments around the world shut down economic activity to stop the spread of the virus, which led to one of the worst stock market crashes in U.S. history.  

As the U.S. economy climbed out of the ensuing recession, prices also rose, which effectively reduced the value of the dollar. The inflation rate increased from 1.6 to 7.1 between 2020 to 2022. 

Because of this economic phenomenon, millions of people began investing in the stock market and in cryptocurrency.   

These new investors include students at the school.  

Around his 18th birthday, senior Neil Corriea invested two-thirds of his money into the stock market to get a head start on his dream of being an entrepreneur. 

“As of now, my focus is not to make money right now; it is to do so in the future,” he said. 

He said he isn’t exactly sure about his business aspirations, but when he decides his goals, he hopes he’ll have enough financial support prepared. 

Senior Tilghman Tate started investing six months ago. 

“I personally just do it casually, just playing [a] little bit,” he said. 

He started out by investing a small amount of money he earned from working as a summer camp counselor. He said having a job led him to making better decisions with his cash.  

“Buying the stocks is easy,” Tate said, but for him, choosing which ones to purchase can be tricky. 

“It is always difficult to decide what to buy because one wrong decision can lead to losing all the money that I invest,” he said. 

Senior Tyler Morris learned how to invest from his older brother amid the beginnings of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

“I jumped on the opportunity,” he said. “Investments are something always good to start early, and I personally am planning to do it for long term and put little bit every month from the money I earn from work.” 

In seventh grade, Junior Ashton Pellock was inspired by his parents, who are software engineers, to mine “crypto.” 

According to Investopedia, mining crypto is performed by sophisticated hardware that solves difficult math computational problems. The first computer to find the solution to the problem receives the next available block chain. A block chain is like the bank for cryptocurrency. 

As of now, Pellock has one “mine” earning him money every day. He’s made $15,000 so far, which he has reinvested in other cryptocurrencies such as Ethereum and Cardano. 

“Money makes more money,” he said. “Crypto is the future.”