Niko Deiters was given 700 euros for his christening. His parents put this money in an account at the Sparkasse. When he was twelve, he was dying to know how much Interest charges he had received. At that point, the money had already been in the savings account for around ten years. “To my disappointment, I found that only 0.12 euros in interest was paid out,” Nikos Deiters told Business Insider. He started looking for alternatives to grow his money and came across a very popular asset class: Shares.
“At the time, my father opened a custody account for me, but he didn’t give me any precise instructions as to which shares I should buy,” says the 18-year-old in retrospect. He chose Apple stock based on his gut feeling. “The iPhone 7 was coming soon and I was interested in technology even then. I figured there couldn’t be a wrong thing to buy these stocks.” His investment turned out to be a stroke of luck. “I invested all the money of 700 euros at a price of almost 90 euros and the value rose enormously.” The shares reached a value of over 400 euros, were split several times and since then he has also bought a few more. His Apple position is currently up 410 percent.
Invest pocket money in stocks
His father wanted him to stay in the stock market and made him a special offer: he gave him 50 euros pocket money per month if he invested the money in a savings plan. Otherwise he would give him less. “That’s how I did it and bought different shares every quarter,” says Deiters. First he invested in Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway.