One of the best ways to grow your long-term capital is by investing your money. Starting an investment portfolio requires you to take a lot of different things into consideration: how much money you are able to invest every month, how you want to invest your money, and most importantly what you want to invest in.
There are a few options available for you to invest your money in to continuously grow your money to use for later in life. To help you decide which types of investments are right for you, here are the most common types of investments:
Stocks
Stocks are ownership stakes in a publicly-traded company. There are lots of different companies that are publicly traded and offer stock options, including Tesla, Apple, GM, and more.
You can purchase stocks at the determined market value for that time. Market values rise and fall due to a number of internal and external factors. When you purchase a stock, you are looking to have its value rise after you’ve purchased it, so you can gain some return on the stock. You can easily check the status of your various stock investments by using a good stocks app from HALO Technologies.
Bonds
By purchasing bonds, you are lending money to an entity – most typically business or government-related. Governments issue municipal bonds, Treasury bonds, notes, and bills depending on the level of government. Companies are able to issue corporate bonds.
When you purchase a bond, you lend the set amount to the company and it reaches maturity in a set amount of time. During the time leading up to reaching maturity, the bond will gain interest. If you keep the bond growing for the specified amount of time, you’ll get the principal loaned money back and interest.
Mutual Funds
Mutual funds consist of a pool of investor money with investments divided into a variety of companies. They can either be actively or passively managed – active management has a fund manager that chooses securities to invest the pool money. Passive managed investments are referred to as index funds, which track market indexes including the Dow Jones and S&P 500.
Exchange-Traded Funds
Exchange-traded funds, or ETFs, are also a collection of investments that track market indexes. However, they are actively bought and sold on the stock market, meaning that their prices can fluctuate the same way as stocks can.
Retirement Plans
You can take advantage of a variety of retirement plans, with the most popular options being 401(k) plans and individual retirement plans (IRA). Both allow you to contribute an amount of money on a typically monthly basis, with this money getting invested into various stocks, bonds and other funds that are exempt from taxes by either letting you invest pre-tax dollars or avoiding taxation when you withdraw money.
Beyond these options, there are various other types of investment opportunities to take advantage of. Overall, you can invest in these areas and more when it comes to building out your investment portfolio. To actively manage your various investments in a convenient way, you can download an investment app to gain insight into your day-to-day returns. These investment apps are great tools to learn more about where and how to invest your money successfully.