I like to worry, makes me feel useful
Kidding obviously, just trying to be helpful, and putting it out there in case anyone else takes that approach.
I like to worry, makes me feel useful
Kidding obviously, just trying to be helpful, and putting it out there in case anyone else takes that approach.
Anyone who is putting themselves into debt of any form, credit card or otherwise, to fund purchases of Monzo shares really needs to bear two things in mind:
This will be a long-term shareholding. Any exit strategy is still years off. You need to be prepared for the money being locked away and untouchable for a long time. And you need to be sure that not having access to it wonāt put you in any financial difficultly down the line.
You may lose money at the end of it. All investments are a risk, youāre effectively betting on the future success of a business and, like all bets, it may go south. Donāt invest any money youāre not prepared to lose. Which again, goes back to the first point. Donāt put yourself in financial difficult over this.
Speaking for myself, I havenāt 100% decided to invest yet. If I do, I have a sum to hand at the moment I could put in and that would make no difference to my day-to-day finances (itās effectively ring-fenced at the moment already), and if I wanted to make a larger investment I have an easy access savings account I could dip into to make up the difference. But I wouldnāt want to dip too much. Thereās a balance to be had between available balance/easy access savings/illiquid investments, so there would be a limit on how much Iād take out of the easy access savings account, if anything.
Everything Iāve said above probably makes me sound 50 years older than I actually amā¦
Nicely put Good advice is timeless
I think I will miss out this round but will let my partner get some. I was lucky to get in the previous rounds so will leave my limit for someone else to use
As you have to be a Monzo customer to invest, this also enables you to have your profile converted to an investor one
Itās part of the larger investment round with institutional investors. Waiting several months is a long time in startup land.
If you follow Monzo on any of many channels then it was patently obvious that this was imminent (and prior warning was given many times)
To be fair, it has felt imminent for about eighteen months.
Nope, maximum a year ago I believe
Ok, so youād be forgiven for not being surprised if it hadnāt happened until next year
Borrowing to fund buying shares is a very high risk strategy. Borrowing to fund buying shares in an illiquid startup is madness.
You should be investing the amount of money you can lose without pain.
Try a thought experiment - you invest this money and Monzo goes bust 5 days later. How unhappy are you?
Itās not that foolish, using credit instead of your own funds is an age old practice; if you know you can pay the money back safely then it can be very powerful - e.g. If I know for fact that I can save up Ā£1,000 in 3 months, taking out a Ā£1,000 loan over 3 months is a reasonably safe bet, it allows you to take advantage now when in 3 months the opportunity is gone.
Or if you have Ā£1,000 in a savings account but it takes 90 days to get the money out - get a loan now, pay off in 90 days.
Credit is not evil, I use Monzo overdraft and loans all the time as it allows me to take advantage of short term credit without having to touch my other investments.
Just be safe and sensible.
Thatās not the point I was making - you should be investing a small fraction of your disposable income in a high risk venture, not saving up.
Why?
Itās called risk management.
90% of startups fail.
If the loss of that money would affect you, you are investing too much.
Agreed, if the loss affects you significantly - but you have to take some risk in life. But we can both agree, youāve got to be sensible.
Investing in a startup is more risky than using credit to buy shares you can pay back a week later. Iām not investing my life savings, and if Monzo went bust I would be annoyed but be no worse off.
Agree from a cashflow point of view the method is quite painful for a lot of folk trying to lineup funds in short orderā¦
But itās really neat execution technologically. Invest from app? Thatās an awesome hookup for Monzo / Crowdcube to scale out over timeā¦ along the lines of āinvest from potā etc. I like it As long as it actually works on Monday but imagine the QA will have been substantial!
Personally, Iāll only be investing what I can afford to lose. Iāve been eagerly anticipating another crowdfunding round for some time now. The timing isnāt perfect for me, meaning I wonāt be investing the maximum, and certainly wouldnāt advocate taking credit to do so. I will be investing as much as I feel comfortable with though - without impacting on my regular outgoings.
I wonāt be touching my Monzo pots, Iāll be transferring funds from my legacy bank. Whilst equally I could take funds from pots and replace them, I think the point here is about why we can only pay with Monzo accounts. Given what we are investing in, I see no logical reason why they would not take that route.
Edit: keeping it relevant.