In this new age, Millennials are well past credit and property and are now using digital currency to invest their savings.
As technology increases its influence on Australia’s younger generations, we no longer look at the property market as the only way to invest. Saving for your first home has been a tradition for most Australians but millennials see things differently.
Millennials (born between 1981 and 1996) have broken away from the status quo and are using the stock market to better their financial futures.
The catalyst was the pandemic. It was February 2020, and the lockdown was looming. Millennials soon made up more than two-thirds of the 1 million new customer accounts opened on the CommSec trading app. Of those new customers, 43% favoured investing rather than spending and 38% preferred the stock market over a property deposit, as was the traditional path.
Speaking to News.com, millennial investor turned podcaster, Bryce Leske explains: “If you think about the costs involved with putting together an enormous deposit, shouldering legal costs, stamp duty … the price of housing ends up being well out of reach for so many people.”
Despite many of his clients having upward and more than $100,000 and still unable to secure a home loan, they now turn to the sharemarket. Others express the frustration saying that investing in shares is easier than property. Management consultant, Ben Spoor told News.com: “Investment properties are a pain and have lots of costs people forget about. Owning shares (index funds, not direct shares) is set and forget.”
Though comfortable to some, Leske understands the complex world of navigating stock markets. Terms like “two-tier tender offer” and “theoretical ex-rights price,” may turn off novice investors so he wants to simplify it for all Australians.
“So many of our community members think investment is something you need a degree in, or that you need to be a financial expert to really understand where to put your money, and that’s just not true,” he said.
Leske’s podcast Equity Mates, which he co-hosts with Alec Renehan aims to break down the financial jargon for everyday Aussies in order to help them grow their wealth.
Hopefully, this means Wall Street won’t seem so scary.
