If veteran investors were given a second chance at investing

Dubai: When veteran investors Anita Yadav and Nisarg Trivedi were asked what they regret the most, they expressed guilt for not having saved and not having reigned in expenses early on in their careers.

“I can think of multiple things but the first thing is to put my investments before my expenses,” Trivedi said. “There was one mistake I did early in my life and that was falling into a credit trap,” he added, explaining how high-interest rates charged by credit card companies kept the bill growing every month.

“One principal that works very well for me is rather than your formula being ‘income – expenses = investments’ your formula should be ‘income – investment = expenses’ – So basically you control your expenses.”

I wish I had started investing earlier because in your 20s or 30s we think we don’t need to plan ahead and just manage our day-to-day expenses.

- Anita Yadav

Anita Yadav said she wished she could have started investing much earlier in life.

“I wish I had started investing earlier because in your 20s or 30s we think we don’t need to plan ahead and just manage our day-to-day expenses,” Yadav said, concluding by saying that an investment of $50 at age 21 is worth more than an investment of $500 at age 50.

The most common regret, according to a global survey of 830 people, was not starting to save for retirement earlier. (Thirty one per cent of the study group cited that as their top regret.) Another lesson they learnt was not investing in stocks sooner, which made up of 24 per cent of the group. These two hold true no matter the respondent’s age.

Younger respondents (77 per cent of millennials) said they wished they’d started investing earlier. Baby boomers were only slightly less sorry than millennials, at 76 per cent. Even young Generation Z’ers have a fear of missing out: 69 per cent of respondents age 18 to 22 said they feel bad about not investing sooner, the survey showed.