JSE Investment Challenge June winners learn to invest and save

The June winners of the JSE Investment Challenge have demonstrated that young people are getting a solid foundation in what it means to invest and save money.

Idris Seedat, Manager: Investment Challenge, says the Investment Challenge plays an important role in helping young South Africans to become savvy with their money. “Saving becomes easier if you understand how to use investment tools. Even if you are young, you shouldn’t hesitate to invest,” Seedat says.

He adds that financial education is important in South Africa where people struggle to save. “It is never too early to cultivate good savings habits and create personal wealth – learning how to invest is a good place to start,” he says.

The June winners in the Income Portfolio category are the ‘JR Investors’ from the Jimmie Roos Special School for Boys in Dewetsdorp, Free State. Team ‘Master Investors’ from Maritzburg College in Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal, took the first position in the Equity Portfolio category. The ‘Gold Coast Development’ team from Diocesan College (Bishops) in Rondebosch, Cape Town won in the Speculator Portfolio category.

Dean Viljoen, Kenneth Mintoor, Willie Robbertse and Michael Victor from the Jimmie Roos Special School for Boys won the Income Portfolio category. Zafar Moosa, Muhammed Dhoda, Muhammed Jooma and Muhammad Essa are the winners in the Equity Portfolio category. Lee Gordon, Thomas Orton, Muhammed Razzak and Murry McKechnie took first place in the Spectacular Portfolio category.
“Congratulations to every team member. You are all deserving winners,” he says.

Anyone can participate in the Challenge and new teams can still register if they want to take on the current leaders in the last few months. The monthly winners each walk away with R500 per team member, R500 for their teacher and R500 for their school.

The JSE Investment Challenge gives high school learners and university students the opportunity to manage a virtual portfolio of JSE-listed shares. Each team starts the competition with a virtual R1 million and tries to make this sum grow by investing it on the equity market. The Challenge has three different categories with differing risks associated with each of them. Teams can choose to compete in the Speculator portfolio (high risk), Equity Growth portfolio (moderate risk) or Income portfolio (low risk). These different games allow participants to select their appropriate wealth management strategy, testing their investment skills against peers.

This year’s competition has five top prizes for the annual winners valued at R60 000 per portfolio in the schools Challenge and another R60 000 in the university Challenge. The competition ends on 26th September after which auditing will take place and the winners announced at the award ceremony held at the JSE in October 2014.

Schools Challenge

The schools challenge is targeted at secondary school learners.

• Any South African secondary school may enter one or more teams.
• Team members must be in grades 8, 9, 10 or 11 to be eligible to participate (it is recommended that learners in grades 8 and 9 participate in the income game).
• Grade 12 learners may also participate with the permission of the school principal.
• A team must consist of four members only.
• Each school must have a supervising teacher or mentor.

To register go to: http://schools.jse.co.za

University Challenge

The university challenge is targeted at all tertiary institutions.

All university students are eligible, but they must be currently registered with the same institution and may form teams - irrespective of field of study of team members. Each participating team may not be less than two members or more than four members at a time.

To register go to: http://university.jse.co.za