First came Jack Isaacs’ launching of businesses in the car-washing, snow-shovelling and online sports-card-flipping realms to make some bucks.
Later, the Merer Island High School (MIHS) student latched onto the stock market side of business through his involvement with the school’s DECA marketing class last year as a junior. The further he became interested in the activities of investment, strategy, risk and reward, he gained a tighter grasp on that monetary world of stocks, bonds and mutual funds and wanted to test his skills in a competition.
Beginning last October and rolling through June, students engaged in the prestigious real-world simulation Stock Market Game that is sponsored in Washington state by the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association. With an imaginary $100,000 in hand, more than 400 teams from 18 schools began strategizing where to spend their money and maximize growth for their profile.
Isaacs achieved the biggest money gain and was thrilled and shocked to win the competition.
“I did a lot of research, so I was glad it paid off,” he said. “And now I’m starting to invest in real stocks with real money, so hopefully it can transfer over.”
The MIHS senior plans to continue traversing the finance route of the business industry, and he’s currently looking at college business schools where he can take his next step toward a possible career in that field.
Shannon Tapp, MIHS teacher and co-DECA adviser, praised Isaacs’ achievements: “Jack demonstrated exceptional performance in his research process during our investing unit, consistently managing his portfolio with thoughtful and diligent decision-making. I am pleased to see him continuing his journey in finance in our accounting and finance course this year. His contributions have also been invaluable to our DECA program.”
Isaacs dove into a couple of strategies that led to victory in the competition, including investing in seasonal stocks at companies like Home Depot and then biting into Apple with the releases of their new phones, computers and more.
“And then overall, just in general for the time I was doing it, my strategy was to find low betas on stocks. So, that basically was to lower the risk for the stock that I was going to invest in,” he noted about another strategy.
The stellar strategizer, who won a $20 Amazon gift card and the pride of taking first, said that his parents, their friends and his buddies have been asking him about investment game plans.
“It’s cool, but also, I don’t know, because I’m still new to it, so I don’t know if everyone should be trusting me necessarily,” he said with a laugh. “Still gotta learn a bit more, but we’re on the right path.”
Life lessons abound for Isaacs within the stock market sphere, he said, noting that patience is key in whatever arises. Also, there are copious risks in life that need to be navigated.
“You don’t want to always rush things,” he said. “So, say a stock is really high in price, and you can see it still going up more, you have to make the smart decision and say if you can’t afford to invest in it, hold off on it, maybe invest in something else.”
