How Long Does it Take to Learn Investing? (2024)

Discover the world of investing, learning how to make informed financial decisions and manage portfolios. Whether you're an aspiring Financial Analyst, Investment Banker, Portfolio Manager, or Private Wealth Manager, this information can help you understand various aspects of investing, likely timeframes for learning, and potential career paths.

Key Insights

  • Investing involves dedicating money to purchase assets that increase in value over time. It's an important skill for Financial Analysts, Investment Bankers, Portfolio Managers, and Private Wealth Managers.
  • There's more to investing than just dealing with stocks. Other investment opportunities include bonds, funds, trusts, private equity, real estate, and even unusual assets like cars, handbags, and watches.
  • On average, it takes between one and five years to grasp investing and understand the stock market, with key learning areas including research, fast-paced decision making, and growing market knowledge.
  • Factors that can affect this learning period include the degree of hands-on practice, emotional control, prior financial experience, and individual learning speed.
  • Investing can be a challenging skill to learn due to the high level of variables involved. However, setting clear goals and understanding financial concepts can help ease the learning process.
  • Noble Desktop offers a range of investing and financial classes, designed to cater to different learning styles and schedules, providing students with knowledge from expert instructors.

Like many aspiring Financial Analysts, Investment Bankers, Portfolio Managers, and Private Wealth Managers, you may want to learn to invest but worry about how long it will take. With all the moving parts of investing, it can be challenging for beginners to keep track of the research and market changes. On average, experts agree it will take an individual between one and five years to understand the stock market. However, the length of time it takes depends on several factors. Keep reading to learn about how you can learn to invest with various resources to help speed up the learning process.

What is Investing?

Investing is dedicating money to purchasing assets that increase in value over time. The main function of investing is to generate returns from invested assets. Investors can invest in several kinds of investments, including stocks, bonds, funds, trusts, private equity, and real estate. Investing in almost any industry can help build capital for businesses.

Investing puts money to work. On the surface, investing can appear like saving money; however, saving money sits in an account, gaining little per year, as saving accounts have an average of 0.7% growth per year. Investors can choose to actively invest, which means they manage their portfolio or passively invest, which means they take a less involved approach to investing. They can also choose to invest in high-growth companies with higher Price-earnings (P/E) or invest in companies that have lower P/E but have higher dividend yields. Both approaches can pay large sums; it depends on how much risk they want to include in their investment portfolios.

Read more about what investing is and why you should learn it.

What Can You Do with Investing?

When you think of investing, the image that comes to mind is Stock Brokers frantically calling in trades as they watch the numbers scroll by on the screen. Stock Brokers are a large part of the investing world. They deal with the stock market every single day. They help keep the economy moving. However, there is more to investing than just stock brokers.

With the internet, anyone can invest in the market using mobile apps. You can also invest to save for retirement or various other reasons. When starting with investing, you want to start an investment portfolio. Often, these portfolios include bonds, stocks, mutual funds, Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs), real estate, and cash equivalents. However, some people choose to invest their money in more unusual ways. One of the key parts of investing is choosing assets that will increase in value over time. Investments can be physical assets as well. One good way to invest is to buy a vacation or rental property that you can rent out. This option allows the money you used to purchase the property to bring more money back to you. Others invest in other items like cars, handbags, or even watches. Each of these items needs a lot of research to ensure they are worth purchasing and if they will bring in more money if sold later.

Average Time it Takes to Learn Investing

On average, starting with investing will typically take between one and five years to grasp the stock market. During the first year, beginners will learn how the stock market works and ways to make trades to become successful. Several experts agree that in the first six to twelve months, one learns the basics and masters those concepts, after which one learns advanced concepts and invests. Here is a sample breakdown of good investing habits a person will learn through these beginning stages.

  • Research. With access to the internet and thousands of resources every minute, it may appear that you will have all the information at your fingertips to make a well-informed trade. However, too much information can lead to analysis paralysis, leading to indecision. When researching stocks, you will learn the essential information you need to make a trade and disregard the rest. However, this will come with practice over time.
  • Make fast-paced decisions. We make decisions every moment of every day; however, most of these decisions are inconsequential. Investors will spend time making split-second decisions with little information. These decisions are high risk, and the intense mental effort can wear down beginner investors.
  • Growing market knowledge. One must understand how the market works to make informed decisions about the market and trade. Throughout the beginning stages of your learning, you will spend time watching the market and learning the patterns within the market. This can help you understand when to make a trade before spending or losing a lot of money.

Other Factors

Investing experts agree that it takes one to five years to learn to invest. However, this average does not account for the other factors that contribute to how long you can expect the process to take. Please remember that none of these factors mean you should not learn to invest; your learning process might take a bit longer without them than others.

Invest as you Learn

While you should understand several concepts and principles when learning to invest, one way to help speed up the process is to invest as you learn. Investing is a real "practice makes perfect" type of skill.

As you learn new concepts or ideas, you should practice them with your investing. You can start with small amounts, but this way, you are gaining experience and seeing how the market reacts as you learn.

Emotional Control

A large part of investing is maintaining a level head and not putting your emotions into each trade. This can be the hardest part for beginners to learn. However, if you already have practiced emotional control, where you can keep your emotions at bay even in the most stressful situations. In that case, you will have an easier time making decisions and learning how to invest.

Prior Financial Experience

Investing requires a lot of financial knowledge. Starting to learn investing with some financial literacy will help you understand some of the complex financial concepts associated with investing. Understanding finance can help you shorten the time you spend learning the financial aspects of investing, not eliminate it depending on your previous experience.

Learning Method and Speed

One of the most common ways to speed up learning skills is to take a class in the subject. Doing this will give you a structured environment to learn the necessary concepts without finding and learning them on your own. However, it is also important to consider your learning speed. If you pick up on concepts easier, then the learning process may take less time than others. However, if it takes you a while to grasp concepts, you may be looking at a longer learning time.

Level of Difficulty, Prerequisites, & Cost

Investors have to keep track of several moving variables to be successful. Oftentimes they are making split-second decisions without all of the information. Because of this, investing is a challenging skill to learn and master. However, there are many ways to invest, and some are easier than others.

Before investing, beginners should develop some versatile skills that will help them with their learning. Beginners should understand how to set goals and ways to make those goals achievable. It would also be helpful if they spent time watching the market and researching companies they would be interested in investing in. A large part of investing is understanding financial concepts. Taking the time to familiarize yourself with some financial concepts can help you throughout your learning process.

To start investing, you can download one of the free investing apps or open a free brokerage account. From there, you can invest the amount you feel comfortable with. Stocks held for over a year before being sold will be subject to capital gains tax.

Read about how difficult it is to learn to invest.

Watch a Free Investing Online Course

Are you not ready to commit to a full course but still want an overview of investing? You can start learning for free online! Check out Noble Desktop's free Stock Market Investing Fundamentals course. In this course, viewers learn the basics of stock market investing and gain an understanding of different investing strategies. You will learn what moves the stock market and the fundamental principles that control the market.

Other providers also offer free investing classes. Udemy offers several courses that cover the basics of investing, with some courses covering topics like cryptocurrency. You can also find some free classes on Coursera. You even have the option to audit their longer investing courses for free. You can find hundreds of investing videos on YouTube to help you get started with becoming investing and financially literate. You can check out Noble Desktop's YouTube channel for investing videos that cover various topics.

Read about more free investing videos and online tutorials.

Learn Investing with Hands-on Training at Noble Desktop

Noble Desktop provides an array of Investing and Financial classes that meet various scheduling requirements and learning styles. No matter how you enroll in these courses, students will learn from expert instructors in small classes. Students may attend in-person training at Noble's Manhattan campus or remotely from anywhere. In addition to the courses, all students can retake the course within one year of completing it for no extra charge, giving them more time to hone their skills.

For those interested in beginning their investment journey, Noble offers a short introduction course, Stock Market Investing, teaching students the fundamentals of the stock market and how to invest. Students will learn what moves the stock market and how investors value stocks. Students will understand P/E ratios and DCF analysis as they dive into different financial statements. While this course does not provide enough information to start your investing career, it does provide vital information that will help you out in your career and get you on the right path.

Students may consider the Financial Analysts Training Program to jump-start a career in the financial sector or with investing. In the program, students work with financial modeling and valuation. As students learn basic and advanced features of Microsoft Excel, they learn to utilize the program for long-term planning, financial functions, and cash flow projection. Those interested in becoming Financial Analysts may also consider the Python for Finance Bootcamp. This course teaches how to use the Python programming language’s financial libraries to gather and manipulate financial data. Both of these courses can jump-start your career in investing!

Key Insights

  • Most individuals learn proper investment skills within one to five years.
  • The first year of investing is grasping basic concepts and the stock market.
  • There are ways to speed up the learning process, including:
    • Invest as you learn
    • Emotional Control
    • Previous Financial experience
    • Learning speed
  • You can speed up any learning process by checking out in-person or live online classes with Noble Desktop.
How Long Does it Take to Learn Investing? (2024)

FAQs

How Long Does it Take to Learn Investing? ›

On average, it takes between one and five years to grasp investing and understand the stock market, with key learning areas including research, fast-paced decision making, and growing market knowledge.

How long does it take to see results from investing? ›

The Rule of 72

Essentially, this rule gives an estimate of how long it may take to double your money by dividing 72 by your rate of return. So, in practice, if you invest with a 10% return, you would double your money every 7.2 years, as 72 divided by 10 is 7.2.

How long does it take to fully understand trading? ›

For learning swing trading, it takes at least 6 months and for intraday trading, at least a year. So don't get discouraged by the time required because this is a skill that will make you money for the rest of your life. There is no retirement in trading as you can trade from your home even when you're 80.

Is learning investing hard? ›

The goal is to generate returns from invested assets. Learning investing can be challenging due to the volume and speed of information, finding reliable resources, and understanding the reactionary market. However, spending time watching the market and connecting with a mentor can make the learning process easier.

How many hours does it take to learn stocks? ›

If you can commit 100% to a good stock trading course, you should be able to get up and running within a few weeks of starting the course. If you're learning in your spare time, you should expect to commit at least 40 hours to structured learning, which you might have to spread over a couple of months.

What if I invested $1,000 in the S&P 500 10 years ago? ›

Over the past decade, you would have done even better, as the S&P 500 posted an average annual return of a whopping 12.68%. Here's how much your account balance would be now if you were invested over the past 10 years: $1,000 would grow to $3,300. $5,000 would grow to $16,498.

How long does it take to learn the basics of investing? ›

Average Time it Takes to Learn Investing

Several experts agree that in the first six to twelve months, one learns the basics and masters those concepts, after which one learns advanced concepts and invests.

How much realistically do I need to start investing? ›

How much should you be investing? Some experts recommend at least 15% of your income. Setting clear investment goals can help you determine if you're investing the right amount.

What is a good age to start investing? ›

If you put off investing in your 20s due to paying off student loans or the fits and starts of establishing your career, your 30s are when you need to start putting money away. You're still young enough to reap the rewards of compound interest, but old enough to be investing 10% to 15% of your income.

How can I teach myself investing? ›

Key Takeaways
  1. Have a plan, prioritize saving, and know the power of compounding.
  2. Understand risk, diversification, and asset allocation.
  3. Minimize investment costs.
  4. Learn classic strategies, be disciplined, and think like an owner or lender.
  5. Never invest in something you do not fully understand.

How many stocks should a beginner start with? ›

“How many stocks should I own as I begin my investing career?” As part of your initial portfolio management approach, you should aim to invest in a minimum of four or five stocks—one from most, if not all, of the five main economic sectors (Manufacturing & Industry; Resources; Consumer; Finance; and Utilities).

How many day traders are successful? ›

Around 1% – 20% of traders earn a profitable margin at the end of the day. The low success rate often discourages the newbies who learn new ways from an online course or television. Studies have shown that around 97% of day traders have lost their money in two years.

How fast do stocks make money? ›

Investing in stocks is one of the most important financial skills you need to master. On average, stocks have given an annualized return of around 10%. At that rate, your money doubles every 7.2 years.

How quickly can you make money by investing? ›

Here's how fast you can become rich by investing
Annual Investment4% Return10% Return
$2,00078 years42 years
$5,00057 years32 years
$10,00042 years26 years
$20,00029 years19 years
Oct 28, 2023

Is it worth investing $100 a week? ›

Investors should allocate $100 each week and buy shares of dividend-paying companies equipped with strong fundamentals. So, if you invest $100 a week, your equity portfolio would balloon to $5,200 in a year and $26,000 in five years.

How long do investments take to grow? ›

The rule of 72 is a shortcut investors can use to determine how long it will take their investment to double based on a fixed annual rate of return. All you do is divide 72 by the fixed rate of return to get the number of years it will take for your initial investment to double.

How quickly do investors expect a return? ›

In the early stages of a startups life, investors expect to see a return of 3 to 5 times their initial investment within 5 to 7 years. However, this is only a rough guideline, and actual returns will vary depending on the company, the stage of the company, and the amount of risk the investor is willing to take.

Top Articles
Latest Posts
Article information

Author: Nathanael Baumbach

Last Updated:

Views: 5575

Rating: 4.4 / 5 (55 voted)

Reviews: 94% of readers found this page helpful

Author information

Name: Nathanael Baumbach

Birthday: 1998-12-02

Address: Apt. 829 751 Glover View, West Orlando, IN 22436

Phone: +901025288581

Job: Internal IT Coordinator

Hobby: Gunsmithing, Motor sports, Flying, Skiing, Hooping, Lego building, Ice skating

Introduction: My name is Nathanael Baumbach, I am a fantastic, nice, victorious, brave, healthy, cute, glorious person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.