Ep 1: What is Self-Directed Investing?

Jessie: Welcome to Market MakeHer, a podcast designed to help you navigate the stock market and achieve financial empowerment.

Jess: In this inaugural episode join us as we introduce ourselves and share our mission of providing inclusive and accessible financial education for all we'll also give you a sneak peek of what's to come as we break down complex investing concepts into simple easy to understand terms. There's a lot of podcasts that are out there that cover budgeting, debt management, saving, credit cards, that's not we're about. The people that do that do a wonderful job. But we are aiming to get into investing topics, make them easy to understand.

Jessie: I'm going to be here asking Jess all of the questions that hopefully you're asking too to make sure we really understand how to dive into our portfolios or where to even begin if we haven't begun yet. How to even look at our 401K's. I know everyone might have a 401K and it's just sitting there. That's what mine was doing and it's still is. I don't know what's going on with it. I would love to know if it's going to allow me to retire when I want to retire or not and other things I can do in the meantime to just make that money make money.

Jess: Yes! and it's so interesting why that doesn't necessarily exist to that level. Which I think is why we should get into who we are and how this really started. I'm Jessica Inskip and I'm what we're calling the resident finance expert.

Jessie: And I'm Jessie DeNuit. A lifelong learner and lover of money and wanting to know how to make more money. I've been very money driven my whole life and I'm selfishly doing this podcast to have Jess’ undivided attention and expertise. This is my chance and hopefully your chance as well to learn more about how to invest in the stock market. I’m taking you along on this journey with me and we're going to let you ask questions as well.

Jess: Yes, and Jessie asks the best questions. She's not afraid to ask any questions. So if you're thinking it, she's going to ask it and that's such an incredible and helpful necessary tool on your financial journey. Interestingly enough and perhaps this is why a podcast like this doesn't exist: I actually had to give up by financial licenses after being in the industry for about 15 years to provide financial education to the masses. Which is a whole other topic itself but it's been really great. I’ve aligned my careers with my values and how much I really love education but also care about women in this space or everyone in this space. I really feel that I've learned so much throughout my career and have been able to work with some really great people. And since I've taken this step of getting rid of my financial licenses, it's really opened some great doors for me. So now I've been on CNBC, Fox Business. I get to work with Jim Cramer, which is amazing. So really excited to continue on this journey with you Jessie.

Jessie: I will admit I didn't ever watch those shows before. But now that you're on them… I'm like obviously tuning in a little bit more and watching your segments and trying to learn a little bit more about this whole world of finance that is very elusive to me. And I'm sure a lot of other people too because I always just felt a little bit intentionally kept in the dark about the world of investing in stocks, and the stock market, and get the right explanations, and stop you when you get into financial jargon land. Make sure we're all understanding what you're talking about!

Jess: Yes! thank you for keeping me out of there!

Jessie: If you feel like the stock market hasn't been for you or learning about investing hasn't been for you, we're going to change that. We're going to teach you. We're going to help you and by we I mean Jess and she's going to teach me and we're all going to learn together!

Jess: Taking the financial jargon out is so important and asking questions. I posted a TikTok yesterday and it was just me stitching somebody else. And I was talking about how the current stock market situation isn't like 2008. But, I was in the middle of my work day and I absolutely used like I would talk on CNBC. So there was a lot of jargon and quick things. Because also when you stitch, you have to do it within 55 seconds. And in the comments, someone said there, “I have no idea what you're saying”. I could say whatever all day long, but if you don't have someone asking what that means, there's no real value there. So that's the differentiation that we bring… and that Jessie brings to the table.

Jessie: Should we talk about a little bit more of how we're going to demystify investing?

Jess: Self-directed investing, it's been around for such a long time. We actually call it discount brokerages. And interestingly enough, I just learned this the first one was created by someone called Muriel Siebert and she was the first female on the New York Stock exchange in 1967.

Jessie: But when you say self-directed investing that's like me I'm a person I downloaded the RobinHood app and I'm just buying some stocks and that's me just self-directing myself on how to invest or what is that?

Jess: That's exactly right. So there are the traditional investing used to always be wealth management. So that's where there's a fee for somebody is managing your portfolio, they choose what stocks your asset allocation. Things that we have other episodes on that we're going to go deeper into. But they do that on your behalf and they charge a fee for that. Then there's like this hybrid version which is automatic or robo advisors and then self-directed investing is where you… and that has a small fee too actually the robo advisors… were you choosing the ETF or index mutual fund, all the products bonds you could buy whatever you want. But it's your choice and then it's a discount brokerage. And this is what RobinHood has done to the industry and the way that they did democratize finance: is they push the boundaries and got commissions to zero. So it doesn't cost and they weren't too much before, they were $7 a trade. But that can add up so now it's zero dollars for a trade, which means that there is no cost to buy a stock or ETF. Whatever you're looking for.

Jessie: But they're making their money somehow and I'm sure we'll get into that. But they are. I'm always curious. I'm like, but, how are they making their money? Like, they wouldn't be a platform if they weren’t making money. But I'm sure that's like for another episode. But OK, So absolutely making money. Yes, self-directed investing is just us being able to go buy stocks ourselves without having to use a trader a person. Like back in the day. Maybe you had to like submit something to a person and they had to go do some things in the Stock Exchange and come back to you and now it's all I guess it's because it's digitized now with these discount brokerages like RobinHood. It's made it open to any individual can just go in and do whatever they want. They could buy a stock, buy an ETF and you don't have to go through another person. Basically.

Jess: Yeah, technology has really progressed and just think about how we can now look up anything on the internet. Because we have technology. We can ask Alexa how to convert something while we're cooking. The same thing with the stock market. That's there's still a lot of data that we have access to. So it's quicker and easier to buy a stock that you are interested in and we'll talk about the details of that in our in our coming episodes.

Jessie: OK but this Muriel Siebert person. She was the first woman on the New York Stock exchange in 1967. What is the significance of what she was able to do?

Jess: So, she made the first discount brokerage and she was also the first female. So good for her. Not only did she break a barrier, she set an industry changing trend. So RobinHood…

Jessie: In the 60s.

Jess: Yes right! RobinHood gave $0.00 trades. So they took away the commission to buy a stock that is a form of a discount brokerage. So she decided… hey I can slash the commissions that it cost to trade that's a discount, that's all it is, it's in the name and a brokerage is a place where you transact. So she paved the way for us to do what we're doing today to be honest.

Jessie: OK that's cool! didn't she do something with the fur coat or something you told me before?

Jess: Oh yeah! that was that was very cool! So if you see the traditional trading jackets on the floor, you know they have the numbers or they're pretty plain. Hers was a very rainbow like fur coat and I thought that was cool and amazing.

Jessie: That's cool! We're going to be talking about all kinds of things. This episode is basically to tell you how we're demystifying the stock market for you and the next episode, episode two, we're going to talk about understanding the stock market because I have so many questions and we're going to get into so many other things on this podcast obviously. Like if you all start asking questions or writing in about things you want to know. Just stay tuned, check out our website www.marketmakerpodcast.com and subscribe.

Jess: We literally have almost 100 episodes just ready to go because of just topics that come up, the questions that I get on my TikTok, or from people around us. We want to make sure that we address them. That they’re what you want to hear. If you don't understand something and we've got topics ready to go. But this is about building a community and what our listeners want so go to that website, subscribe, so you can get the updates, send us your questions! That's what we're here for!

Jessie: Yeah! Remember Jess gave up her financial licenses to do this. So, let's take advantage. The goal we're all here to try to make some money. I know I like to learn. I know I like to make money. I know I want my money to grow up and get a job and make more money. Let's learn how to do that that thing rich people do where they make their money make money.

Jess: Yeah, But please don't give me a big head that was very nice of you to say! I'm just here for the financial education. And we can get into why I had to give up my licenses. Which is always such an interesting topic. But, I do think it's important to say: it's not the brokerage firms faults at all. It's just the way that the FINRA rules were laid out really for advisory and not the self-directed world. Before social media was even a thing. The FINRA rules say that you have to review every piece of content that your registered representative puts out, any type of communication, and make sure that it's in line with your firm policies. If you think about how many registered representatives are there, now amplified with technology, that's inclusive of social media posts. So they just purely prohibit it… because it's costly and timely to review everyone's information that they're putting out.

Jessie: Which is good. But like it also paves the way… I mean if you think about it. Then all the financial advisor education you might be getting on TikTok or social media. That means it's coming from people who never had a license to begin with or are they're like you and giving up your licenses. But a lot of people don't just give up their licenses… because that means like you can't do that work anymore? Right?

Jess: That's absolutely true. It's not like your healthcare licenses or even a lawyer. You have to be sponsored by a brokerage firm. So the second you put in your two weeks notice, you literally get this notification in the mail. You get your what's called a U5 back and it tells you that you are no longer registered. But we can Google FINRA Broker Check and you can pull up anybody and see if they were licensed and if they were active and for how long. You can do that with anybody on TikTok or anybody you see. But yeah, you're right, that's why social media has been flooded with misinformation in the financial world. Because the financial world is more regulated even than healthcare. Which is insane to me. Especially because I've spent so long in this industry. I cannot tell you how frustrating it is to work in a place where you are trying to, on the brokerage firm side, get really good education, but you can't compete with Finfluencers who are saying watch me turn $500 into $10,000. First of all ,that's that's not realistic. That is not allowed per the rules. Because it's not realistic, false and misleading. You can't put that type of information out there. So it's just really really difficult.

Jessie: So, you can if you don't have any licenses. You can do whatever you want. So yeah, I think that's a great! Like and we definitely need to put that in the show notes on the website about how you can check that website you said. See I already forgot it. So we're going to put all that information for FINRA rules or how you can check if people actually are legit and know what they're talking about. But so someone who's given up their financial licenses like you… is there like a history that would show that you had these credentials and gave them up? So yeah, so you can check out your resources and that's something we're going to also empower you all with and myself. Learning how to find resources that are reliable and how to check up on if the people you're listening to actually know what they're talking about too and like how much experience they have. I think that's important yeah so good to know I didn't know any of that!

Jess: Well, a lot of people don't! Because one, if you have your licenses, you don't talk about it, because you're frustrated, and you also can't. Even my friends at brokerage firms, they can't even share anything I've worked on because they're financially licensed. Which is unfortunate,

Jessie: Wow

Jess: Which really amplifies misinformation

Jessie: Well, I'm glad you gave up your licenses. Because we need better information out there. And I think a lot of people do turn to social media for their news and their information so I think it's important for us all to know how to make sure who we're listening to is like giving us accurate information. Every episode, we're going to have episode equity.

Jess: Fun words! analogy yeah! Yeah!

Jessie: We’ll have resources for each episode, all for free! All you gotta do is subscribe and listen!

Jess: Yeah! We’re here for financial education. That is really important. Going back to discount brokerages, RobinHood paved the way with $0.00 commissions and that applied competitive pressure to all of the other brokerage firms. So, TD, Fidelity, Merrill, just to name a few, Schwab, just so all of them dropped their stock and ETF commissions to zero as a result of competitive pressure. Since it's the self-directed world, the way that they attract investors is by their key differentiators and the tools and resources that they offer you for free. But those brokerage firms want your business. So they have tools to help you demystify this and we're going to make sure we show you what those are, how to access them, how to maximize those tools, what brokerage firm is better for what, what different types of accounts are out there. To make sure that you fully not only understand how the stock market works, but understand the tools and resources that are available to you as the self-directed investor. The next episode we… I think it's fun how it was born was watching the Rihanna concert. The Super bowl, Jessie and I were working day and night on our our podcast and our beautiful website must I say. And I made this infographic on what is the stock market, and then I just made a TikTok on it and that instantly got I think it's about 86,000 views now. But it's just breaking down just how it works what it's comprised of, the internal and external factors. So what impacts it. So we decided to make our first episode off of that and then we're going to build from there. Make sure that you subscribe so you get a notification of that. Share this, get the word out, because we want to make sure that we provide as much value as possible and that is absolutely required by a community and answering questions and of course subscribe so you can get the resources that are going to be available to you! Because we also wrote an article every single episode!

Jessie: And you can also find the links to everything in the show notes.

Jess: thank you for tuning in we hope you enjoyed this first episode we're really excited to get started! Make sure you join the Market MakeHer community and check out our website at: marketmakeherpodcast.com and make sure you subscribe, and like, leave us comments, and of course listen to this podcast on your favorite streaming platforms!

Jessie: and possibly even YouTube because we did the video recording in our capes.

Jess: yes

Jessie: and our little Cape jackets! if you want to see the caped glory, check out the video version.

Jess: We've also decided that we might wear different outfits and gowns who knows. So, tune in!

Jessie: you never know what you're going to get. But there will be a theme every episode. Who knows?