The Investment Game

The Stock Market Game

Published On: January 24, 2025Categories: Basics

Investing is available to everybody, and you don’t have to start with a lot.

In 2013, my grandpa developed a “stock market” game for me, my sisters, and my cousins to play. He said he did it because it occurred to him that nothing in our educational career would let us know that it’s possible to have our assets work for us and not just us working for a living.

Most people who work for a living don’t really become interested in investing until they’re in their late 40s early 50s when they’ve finally got some money. When they do start investing in stocks and bonds, they come from a layman’s perspective. They try things that they’ve heard from their neighbors, and if it doesn’t work, their response is “well, I’ll never do that again,” as opposed to asking themselves, “Did I start at the wrong time? Did I buy the wrong thing? What discipline did I use?” So, they never really learn how to invest. His goal was to find a way to give his grandkids a leg up on how to use money to make money.

Here’s how the game worked…

  • Pick 3 or 4 stocks

  • Write down an explanation for your choices

  • After 12 months, you get to spend half of anything your investment made over and above taxes and inflation

Every year at our family’s Christmas gathering, Grandpa would ask us to write down what we learned and share it with him and the family. Sharing what we learned helped all of us shape our idea of what money is for.  Grandpa says the valuable lesson we learned is that stock picking, investing, isn’t just a game; it’s a business. And it’s available to you, but it’s helpful if you know what you’re doing. You can learn to do the job well, or you can find someone to do it for you–both are rational decisions.  The point is, investing is available to everybody, and you don’t have to start with a lot.

Grandpa says he wanted to share lessons on making–and learning from–mistakes.  Every business makes mistakes. Every job has drudgery; some have 20% drudgery, and some have 80%. Unless you enjoy a job enough and do it well enough to get through the bad times, you won’t be around for the good times. That’s kind of the substance of what the stock game is all about–make mistakes when we’re young and can recover from them rather than waiting until we’re 50. And, in treating it as a game, the losses are no more detrimental than the gains are positive. It helps take some of the emotion out of it.

“At one time I maintained that you need 3 things to invest in the stock market: you need a consistent philosophy – some people are value players, some people are growth players, but it helps to be consistent. Second, you need perspective. No matter what your philosophy is there will be periods of time where it doesn’t work. Then what comes into play is you need the discipline to stick with what you know and believe. And if you’re willing to be disciplined, you can make money at the expense of other people’s indiscipline.”

– Ron Muhlenkamp


This information is intended for informational and educational purposes only and is not individual investment or tax advice. Investing involves risk, principal loss is possible.

Please remember that I am not an investment advisor nor am I a portfolio manager, but I can introduce you to a few.

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