Technology: The 2 Things Stopping Filipinos from Investing in Bitcoin

Everyone wants to make money. Most ways to make huge amounts of money are hard such as starting a successful business or getting a stressful high-paying job. People who look for relatively effortless ways to make money turn to investing. There are a lot of investment vehicles out there, and some are better than others. The best performing asset as of 2020 is cryptocurrency. The most well-known cryptocurrency is Bitcoin.

 In the Philippines, not a lot of people trade nor invest in cryptocurrency. There aren't a lot of investors nor traders in the stock market neither but there are definitely more Filipinos who've dabbled in the stock market compared to cryptocurrency. So what's stopping Filipinos from taking a shot at the best performing asset of the year?

1. The Concept

Crytpocurrency, Blockchain, and Bitcoin are all still alien terms to the Filipino salaryman. They still don't understand what a decentralized public ledger means. Investing in gold is unusual in the Philippines, so it's hard for them to wrap their heads around the idea that Bitcoin is the new gold either. Cryptocurrency is hardly ever talked about in the local news, so the public never really learns about the important updates going on with the blockchain system such as forks. The news doesn't even talk about the wild fluctuations in price that Bitcoin goes through, so investor and trader interest doesn't grow in the country at all.

2. The Steps

Investing in cryptocurrency in the Philippines is complicated work. It's not the most difficult thing ever but there are a lot of hurdles to go through if you want to own some bitcoin. It's not as simple as buying stocks wherein you just set up an account at an online broker and click buy or sell on a website. Buying cryptocurrency involves moving money through digital wallets around a lot, and there are several tedious security checks to deal with. Buying bitcoin presents a steep learning curve that requires some tech literacy and the ability to follow multiple step-by-step instructions.

I believe that the concept can be overcome so long as the Filipino strives to educate themselves on the topic. Having more resources readily available for the Filipino to reach can prove immensely helpful in this regard. I also believe that the steps can be mastered with some perseverance because once you understand the concept, you know the steps are ultimately worth it, but at the same time developers simplyfing the steps to buying cryptocurrency will also make investing in bitcoin more of a possibility for a large number of Filipinos.

Travel: Airbnb rooms, and what it's like owning one

Not too long ago I wrote a blog post about investing in the stock market. That's all well and good and it's definitely a way to put money to work, but I'm always looking for more streams of income. I've done some research and now I want to talk about another thing I got into: Real Estate. Or more specifically, an Airbnb.

Renting out rooms on Airbnb is something that a lot of people like me and you are looking forward to doing. Unlike Uber in the sharing economy, hosting an Airbnb is a lot more passive. So yes, as you may have guessed, it's sweet passive income. It especially doesn't sound like a bad idea here in the Philippines. We always have tourists coming into the country who need a place to sleep in. Since they're travelers, they're normally affluent enough to freely spend their money on things like accommodations.

With this in mind, I'm helping my dad out with our Airbnb venture. We're renting out our spare condominium in the East of Galleria Building at Ortigas, Pasig. It takes some considerable work to get the place into shape. Below are some things I learned during the process:

1. Invest in your Airbnb room; Make it Presentable

You can't just clean up your room and then sign up for Airbnb. A good first step is to declutter and exterminate any and all pests (which is what we did despite how difficult it is), but afterwards you have to go the extra mile once you're done with that.

You need to put some money into your Airbnb. Investing in an Airbnb is much more short-term compared to truly investing in Real Estate like the 1% like Warren Buffet or Robert Kiyosaki does. Investing in an Airbnb also implies that you aren't buying new property completely from scratch; most Airbnb hosts are renting out apartments and condominiums that their sons and daughters used to live in before moving out.

The room is still a work-in-progress, but we've come so far at this point.

When I say you need to invest in your Airbnb, what I mean is you need to spend money to have your room renovated, and refurnished with brand new appealing furniture.

2. Cover the basics and necessities.

We bought numerous items to make our Airbnb look good, but while it's fashionable, we needed to make sure that it's also functional. A lot of shopping for electrical appliances went into the creation of our Airbnb room. We wanted the tenants to be able to make coffee, so we bought a coffee maker. We wanted them to also have tap water they can drink, so we installed a water purifier underneath the kitchen sink.

We also bought electric stoves for cooking, and a comfortable bed for sleeping in. Below is a short list of the items we bought that I can name from the top of my head.

My sister helping me and my dad build the new bed

• A new carpet
• A new coffee maker
• Kitchenware (e.g. knives, forks, etc.)
• Ornamental vases
• Statuettes
• A new bed
• Water purifier

2. Ask yourself "Do I want to live here?"

Even though your tenants will only be staying at your place for at least a couple of nights and a week at most, you should endeavor to create an environment that you yourself would live in.

I like to pretend that we're setting up a new place that we'll be staying in. If ever we have no tenants sleeping in the place for a night, we can actually stay there just fine since it's our own property.

If worse comes to worst, like say, your original residence catches fire, at least you won't lose everything; you still have another place that you can use, and it'll be nice and cozy.

3. You're starting a business, no matter what anybody else says and you ought to be proud.

Some purists don't think you're truly starting a business when you sign up to rent your property via Airbnb, similar to criticisms that people buying franchises aren't true businessmen because they aren't starting from scratch. I humbly disagree with that. At the very basis of it, a businessman/entrepreneur is someone who is willing to put time and money into something, with the belief that it will generate money for them in the future. Airbnb renters -- and franchisees -- fit well into that description. We are merely leveraging on the services available to us.

Our walls have been renovated. You can see the new carpet on the couch.

That's all I can say about setting up an Airbnb room for now. Within the year we'll be having our first tenant, hopefully. We're targeting to have the room rented out during the first half of the year, at best.

What are your experiences about owning property? Comment below and share your knowledge to us millennials and Gen-Z kids that don't know what it's like :)

Reflection: 4 Big Misconceptions when Investing

Did you know that less than 1% of the Philippine's population have invested in the stock market? That's less than 1 million people, in a country populated by 100 million people. (Source) If you already have some money in stocks, then congratulations, because that makes you different from most of the people in the country (the whole world, actually) and you're actually thinking about the future.

If you have some money in the stock market and you're actually making money, then that's even better, because that doesn't happen often in our economical climate. Most people buying stocks won't admit it, but they're actually losing money in the stock market. Why is that? Because risk is a very real factor in the stock market that a lot of people either don't understand or tend to underestimate. They mostly treat the market as if it's one giant casino to gamble your hard-earned money into, as if any stock you choose has the same amount of chance of making money. That's not a very good mindset to develop.

Traders like to use terms like "bulls", "bears" and "death cross" to make their lives sound more exciting.

I know stocks sound boring, especially for a blog titled "Escapist Adventures", but it's always been something that I'm very fond of because I believe that being responsible with money is the key for us to live free and adventurous lives. I've been investing for a couple of years now, hoping that the money I put in will pay-off in the far-future.

Most stock market gurus will tell you that there's a lot of learning and discipline involved when you get into the stock market. Obviously that's true, but what I don't like is that they don't try to expound any deeper than that. I'm fed-up with all these so-called stock experts refusing to go into detail on the learnings that a beginner to the stock market would find useful.

So with that said, I've listed down some misconceptions I had that I corrected once I got more experienced with investing:

Misconception 1: When you buy a stock, the Gain/Loss percentage you see at your port will start off as 0.0%

This is false. It sounds like it makes sense because theoretically when you buy a stock and as long as the price doesn't increase or decrease in value, then you'd have made no profit nor loss. That's reasonable logic, but what most people don't know is that online brokers tend to include their broker fees when you buy a stock. So unless the stock rises in price, you're more likely to see a red negative percentage after you've clicked buy.

It's not a very big percentage; it would be around -1.0% if you buy the bare minimum. Seeing the red number is kinda discouraging at first, because it has a psychological impact on your brain and you assume that you've made a mistake. It honestly stops becoming a big deal when a) you know that it's just your broker's commission, and b) you've done your research and you're confident the stock you bought is going to gain much more than that in the future.

Misconception 2: Investing has little to no risks compared to trading, and putting your money into stocks and never taking them out will allow your wealth to constantly grow upwards and increase in value

This is only partially true. Investing is less riskier than trading, but there are still some risks involved when you invest. In the long-run, investing in stocks will indeed increase your wealth, but the short-run will have moments where your stock will be plunging down and you begin to question if you made the right choice. It's very hard to not let your emotions get the best of you. I can speak from experience that there are times when I get so frustrated and irritated at how low my stocks have gotten.

A glimpse of my port back in November 2018. It's red with all the losses I've accumulated.

Regardless of your decisions, the stock market will go through some ups and downs -- just like life itself. The beautiful thing about stocks and life is that when we're prepared for the downfalls, they become manageable and their impacts don't look so bad. It's also a nice thing to know that time and time again the stock market has proven that it can always rise higher and better in the long-run. Maybe the same is true for life itself?

This is my portfolio in January 2019. It's clearly looking greener than it did last year.

My stocks are in the green right now, but I'm mentally prepared for my portfolio to bleed red all over again once the market goes into another crash. I'm prepared because I know that the companies that I invested in won't stay down for long, and the crash is just a sign that the stocks I want to buy are on bargain sale.

Misconception 3: As long as you invest in Bluechip stocks, you'll start to see profits in a few months

Stock picking is a lot more complicated than that, and investing takes much longer than that. But when I was still a beginner in the stock market, I was naive enough to assume this misconception. I bought MEG and DMC in my first year of investing. I didn't hold onto them for very long because every week I was looking to see how much I gained. I was running out of patience because my gains were so small -- less than 1%, and I didn't understand just how long "long-term investing" really is.

It turns out I bought the stocks at a bad time when the market was going sideways after an upwards trend. Eventually the prices sunk and I sold all my shares because of disappointment.

Misconception 4: Stocks have compounding interest aka "interest on interest" that turns $1000 to $1,000,000 in 20 years

I used to hear so many fairy tales pertaining to investing wherein if you invest $1000, you'll get $1 million in 20 years thanks to compounding interest. These stories are very misleading, because the truth is it's almost impossible to find an investment vehicle that will constantly give you 5% and upwards per year. It most certainly isn't true in stocks. If your starting investment in a stock is 25,000Php and you don't touch it for 20 years, you won't get compounding interest. The closest thing to compounding interest in stocks is when your dividends are reinvested, which is what Mutual Funds do for you automatically.



Aaaand that's about all the time I have for this topic without getting too boring. There are probably some other things I've learned that I could talk about but nothing comes to mind that I want to extensively write about like I did with the 4 items I just mentioned. It was my own experience and time that taught me what was right and what was wrong in the stock market, but I also want to thank the book The Intelligent Investor for showing me the right path. It might not be the right path for everyone per se, but it's the path that works for me. Warren Buffet wasn't joking when he said it's one of the greatest books on investment ever made.

What are some misconceptions you had with stocks that you've overcome? Let me know in the comments below. What you learned can save a newbie from making a big mistake :)