 What's up guys? You're about to watch this interview right here that I did with Will from the Financial Wolf talking about, you know, our outlook on the stock market in 2019 as well as some of my personal story, you know, growing up with the stock market and stuff like that. So if you guys enjoyed this video, drop a like, leave a comment, subscribe, tell me what you think about it and also check out Will's channel, The Financial Wolf. The link is down below in the description box. Go subscribe to him. Pretty solid content. I'll catch you guys in tomorrow's video. Enjoy this one. Thanks for watching. Okay. What is up everybody and welcome to The Financial Wolf channel. So today I'm here with Stas Surface, a special guest here today. We're going to be talking about, you know, the markets where we see them going in 2019 and also just simply like how he got started in investing. I'm going to be interviewing him today and also guys, his channel will be linked in the description just to thank you for being here. So definitely subscribe to him if you're interested in stock market investing. Thanks so much for having me. Yeah, this should be a pretty fun video. So Stas, you mentioned that you were into like all sorts of trading, you know, swing trading, long-term investing. How did you get into this and are you doing this full-time currently? Yeah, for sure. So just a little background story on me. I got into investing at around like 17 years old, roughly like 17 and a half, and then I actually got into trading a little bit after that. So, you know, how it went for me pretty much is that, you know, I went to college starting out at like 18. I majored in marketing and finance. And then, you know, as I got deeper into investing and trading, I really got passionate about that. And then, you know, now I'm finishing off my fifth year in college actually. And yeah, and I'm really interested, you know, in just everything that's been going on in the markets right now. It's just been absolutely crazy. So, okay. So you're in college, you're trading. I've been scaling up this whole trading thing over these past couple of years. And right now it is my main source of income. And, you know, I'm also doing some other e-commerce stuff. I flip on the side. I'm actually going to get my real estate license as well. And really just looking at investment properties too right now. So, a bunch of stuff going on for me. And, you know, just it's just been great. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah. Real estate has, it's obviously it's made the most millionaires in the world. It's definitely a great way to invest your money, you know, that that rents out. And trading is also, you know, a great way to build massive wealth. That's like the two ways, the two best assets. Long-term investing, you know, compound interest, dividend. You know, I'm just interested in all of that. And, you know, it's just been a great journey so far. I'm loving every day, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah. So, yeah. I got into trading and investing, I guess, long-term investing last year when I was 15 years old. So basically I just started out buying some stocks. I literally, my first stock was like $300. I try to put a little bit of money in there every single month. You know, I make some money from flipping phones. And I just like to just, I'm not really too into trading, but it's definitely something that's interesting, right? I mean, the returns are much higher. Obviously there's more risk, but with the stock market volatility, it's, you know, you can definitely make a lot of money. Especially these past couple of months. Yeah, from the beginning of October to now, it's just been, it's been mayhem honestly, like the ups and downs, you know, 700 points swings one day, down 1000 points the next day. I mean, right now it's the best time for the trading environment, I think, like volatility. Yeah. Because like Thursday, I believe, you know, stocks were down like 700 points and then they completely rebounded on Friday. So, yeah, yes, there's balls or something like that. But I mean, it's also difficult to tell, but when that news comes out, the market's just reacting at crazy swings, right? Just crazy, not like that. Right. Yeah, 2017 was a fantastic year. It was fantastic. Are you doing any options? Are you just simply doing swing trades? Now, mostly my strategy over the past couple of months, since honestly, the beginning of October has been mostly day trading. That's what I've been covering on the channel. You know, the market that we're in right now, like I said, extremely volatile. So it's been kind of hard for me to actually take successful swing trades with the downturn of the market, right? It makes sense. Like you wouldn't swing trade Apple, you know, at $160 if it's heading down to 140 based on the trend, right? Yeah. So that's pretty much why I've been just, you know, mostly focusing on, you know, the volatility ETFs, you know, inverse ETFs that trade on, you know, the gold futures, you know, natural gas, stuff like that that we talk about, you know, all the time on the channel. And, you know, of course, I've been buying up some long term positions over the past couple of weeks as well. So that's pretty much mostly my strategy right now. Yeah. So like right now, you're kind of, you're focusing on making that money with the swing trades, but you're obviously with stocks being undervalued in my opinion, I see stocks at very low evaluations, especially with, you know, company earnings. They're not terrible at all. Like, Yeah, not too bad. I mean, they've slowed down a bit over the past 20, you know, over the past two, three years. But I mean, that's expected with, you know, how long we've been in this bull run. So yeah, it was definitely hard to beat how earnings were in the first half of like the first quarter of 2018 and 2017 for just tremendous. It's very difficult to grow at crazy insane numbers. Like, especially with like Facebook, like they like, I have a big position in Facebook but it's just because I mean, so many users that people are freaking out, you know, user growth can't grow just like with Apple, like iPhone units can't grow, but there's definitely opportunity in terms of profitability with the companies and especially with, especially with Apple in terms of 5G when that 5G iPhone comes out. That's the next big side. Yep. Big thing. Yeah. If you look into 5G, it's definitely a great opportunity for Apple. Like I haven't started a position in the company yet, but currently they're falling knife. I definitely think they'll be in that 130 range, 140 range. Honestly, yeah, especially with the revenue cuts that they just came out with a couple days back and you know, weakening sales in China, which is one of the biggest markets, obviously. You know, I do see Apple going down to 130, maybe even lower. We really can't tell right now, but yeah, I think there's always potential downside and the type of market we're in with all this volatility. I think a lot of things can happen. Yeah. And going into that, like with that whole trade war thing, if this trade war gets settled in 2019, the markets are just going to shoot up, in my opinion, unless we're in some sort of recession, which I mean, we're not no indications of that right now from what I'm seeing. But that's trade war gets settled. Trump settles with China's president. I definitely see the market shooting up, but we'll really see. What are your thoughts on that in 2019? Honestly, my thoughts on this, it's, you know, we are towards the end of an economic and market cycle right now in my personal opinion, right? Since the huge crash in 08, I mean, it's been about 10, 11 years and typically over time, I mean, we see a recession, you know, a stock market crash every five to, you know, 10 years. So I'm kind of cautious in 2019. I view it as a good buying opportunity for if you have a five, 10 year outlook. But, you know, with everything going on, rising interest rates, obviously the trade war right now, you know, the economy isn't as great as it was about two, three years ago. It's sort of down. You know, I do think there's downside looking in the one to two year range right now, which again, you know, if you believe in the markets long term, which I know you do, I for sure do, like in the 10 year outlook, I think right now in the next year or two, very great buying opportunities if we do end up, you know, into a recession, just my personal opinion. But if we're looking at the economy as a whole right now, I mean, it's not looking too bad in a sense that, you know, oh my God, we're going to have a recession, right? Because unemployment is at about 3.9%. GDP is actually doing pretty solid. If we're looking at the trend in the past couple of years. So I think we're not weakening as an economy. I think the stock markets overreacting quite a bit. But I do think there is downside, if that makes sense, you know? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, obviously the economy is slowing down, especially from 2017. From what I've looked, I wasn't in the market at that time, but that's when I really began looking into it. And the markets were doing very well in that year. And definitely the economy has slowed down since then, but it's still, you know, historically doing very well. And if you really believe in the markets over the long term, I mean, it's not a big deal. Like if you bought at the peak of like 2007, like you'll be up 80%, 90%. And the savings account, it would have been like 10%. Exactly. If you believe in the market 10, 20 years, you know, you can pick stocks that you think are going to do well and you'll most likely make money if they don't disappear, you know? Has trading been better with the volatility? Because there's definitely a lot of money to be made. I know big investment in volatility. Exactly. That's when, you know, the big, you know, trading banks, you know, they make the most money because people are buying, selling all the time, commission coming in. And that's for sure when there's the most trading, because that's what's causing the volatility, you know? Yeah. So are you doing pretty well from before with trading? You're focusing more on that. Just to go back to what we started off, this video with, yeah, you know, I started investing when I was 17 with the more, I've always had the long term aspect, right? Because even earlier than that, when I was like literally a kid, you know, I used to go to my grandparents' house back in New York. And my grandfather actually always used to watch the stock market on the TV. And I would always sit with him and watch the news and all the tickers and stuff like that. So I always had that interest. And I always had that longer term aspect. And when I started when I was 17, you know, that's what I came into, right? You know, bought some index funds, whatever, you know, index ETFs, stuff like that. And then I started to get deeper into, you know, stock picking, right? Looking at, you know, fundamentals, looking at the balance sheets, the income statements, conference calls, you know, stuff like that. You know, that's when I got into trading, when I was about like 18 and a half, 19, about a year, about a year and a half. And then I got into, you know, the swing trading. And at that point in time, right? Swing trading was great because back in like, well, year was just like 2014, 2015, the markets were like this, right? Swing trading was much easier when the markets were, you know, overall in that bull run going up, you know, there wasn't much volatility. And, you know, that's pretty much when I got into swing trading and the whole day trading thing, you know, it's just been a grind over the past three, four years, getting to where I am right now, for sure, though. A lot of study, a lot of everything, you know, losses, I've taken big losses. And I've also made a pretty good amount of money on trades, right? So you just got to master the craft, right? It's a craft 100%. Yeah, there's definitely a system when it comes to trading, right? It's not just best work. Yeah, people always think it's risky, but if you know what you're doing, if you're looking at those charts, you know what you're looking at, right? It's risky. I'm not going to lie. I mean, it's not the, you know, safe out there. I mean, but hey, we all signed up for this, you know. Yeah, so in terms of me, I'm mainly doing individual stocks, but I'm trying to kind of change my portfolio where I'm doing like half index funds, half like actual individual stock picking, just because I kind of enjoy picking stocks for myself, buying fun. It's more interesting for me because I get to look into that specific company because in terms of like, like in buying an S&P 500 index, you only own like a small portion of all these companies and you're, it's like, you know, to keep track of like the overall, all the businesses, what's going on. Yeah, I agree. So it's when picking stocks, I love it, you know, doesn't get old. Yeah, it's definitely cool. Like I really do look forward to seeing how the market does in 2019. I'm definitely, the trade war is a big part of it. Absolutely. How everything's going to turn out. So should be really good. We'll see. We'll see. So anything else you would like to add to kind of wrap this video up? You know, if you're out there and you're, you know, you're trying to become a trader or an investor, you have to, you know, you have to put in the work guys. A lot of people in today's society, you know, a lot of people that hit me up message me on Instagram, whatever it may be, you know, they want that instant gratification. They want that money right then and there. But if you have an outlook on the economy, you know, the US stocks, everything that's going on right now, you know, in this world, right, you know, this, this market's going to go up over time and you have to just put the work in to figure out how to make money in individual stocks and with trading, right? And if you're trading, you know, paper trading at first, 100%. So you can, you know, practice with fake money, right? And you can make all your losses, mistakes with that money. And, you know, then once you feel comfortable with your strategy with paper trading, whatever you may be doing, day trading, swing trading, then you could swing that money over, you know, start a real account with your actual saved money and you'll feel more comfortable without having that, you know, thought of losing all your money, right? So definitely just doing your own research, you know, putting the hours in every single day, make it your obsession to be the best trader and best possible. That's really all I can say. Yeah, you're definitely right, right? But I mean, I started paper trading, like even though I did long-term investing, I learned how to look at a bank, I learned how to analyze income statements. I learned how to, you know, what interpret the ratio, the PE ratios, price to earnings. Yeah, I learned how to analyze all that. And I was still, you know, I was trading with fake money. I was using a website, I believe it was called How the Market Works. I mean, you get like $100,000 virtual cash, you invest it, and you can even get started with like 300 bucks. I think that was my first investment. I mean, obviously don't expect to make like $500 out of the trade. Don't even like expect to make $50 out of the trade, right? You might lose money, but definitely that experience of that $300 is worth like, it's worth way more than that $300 because more because you can scale up, right? Exactly. Yeah. I mean, just learning how to invest with like a small amount of money, like if you're getting started with like $200,000, like it's definitely risky because I mean, you have a lot of money to lose then. There's always that you can always scale up. That's the great thing about trading and investing, you know, because it's a percent gain, right? It's not a money game. It's a percentage, you know, how much you can gain on each trade or on long-term investments, right? And you can plug in whatever amount of money into that and it multiplies, right? It's just a percentage gain. Yeah. The sooner you get started, the more compound interest will be your God like Warren Buffett, right? But it's worth talking 11 years old and look at him. Definitely a great way. So guys, just get started. As he said, paper trading first, learn how to analyze stocks, and then you can get started with any amount of money. So definitely appreciate you being here, Stas. It was great having you on the channel. Again, he'll be linked in the description. So if you guys want to learn about stock market investing, go ahead, check out his channel. He's got a lot of good content on there. This video will also be up on your channel, right? It'll be on mine. Awesome. Awesome. So definitely comment. Be in there. So thank you guys all and peace out. See you guys.