Author: Ben

The Montreal Biodome

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Biodome_de_MontrealThe Montreal biodome is an enormous indoor ecosystem that holds penguins, fish, birds, and many other animals. It’s fun to explore the giant building. Some sections were very interesting like the penguin exhibit and the huge fish tank. But compared to other parts, some sections of the building weren’t very fascinating, although most places were very attention grabbing and great for kids.

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I spent about an hour and a half here before running out of things to do, and I’d likely recommend the biodome to almost everyone visiting Montreal. The building itself is really cool to visit and the place where the Montreal Olympic games were held is literally less than 100 metres from this building. Kids will love the biodome, as well as their parents the second they get the chance to visit.

That’s all for now, Ben

Investment Knowledge

Look how much knowledge you’ve gained about investing since you started reading my posts. If you’ve read every post that I’ve published on the Stock Market, then you’re almost ready to buy your first stocks! This week I will finish writing about some of the absolutely essential information you’ll need and then you’ll be ready to buy your first shares in any company! I’ll even give you some more investing tools to work with on Friday. So stay tuned for the final posts about the basics of the stock market.

That’s all for now, Ben

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Jaro Palace Royal Hotel (Quebec City)

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I recently stayed in the Palace Royal hotel while on vacation. The room I stayed in had a sofa bed as well as a queen sized bed. The room included a small fridge as well as a fairly large bathroom. The desk space was convenient for anyone who needs somewhere to work and the TV’s in both the main room and the bedroom were great for entertainment purposes. One very interesting part of the hotel was that about half of the rooms had a balcony view of the indoor pool, although for some reason the door to the balcony was locked in my room.

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Balcony View of Pool

The hotel featured a very small fitness centre, a tropical garden, and a nice restaurant with a buffet. It was in a great location within walking distance of the wall the surrounds Vieux-Quebec (Old Quebec). The biggest benefit of the hotel was definitely the location. It is a ton of fun to explore this city as well as other cities in Quebec.

If you’d like to see more on the Palace Royal Hotel go to https://www.hotelsjaro.com/palace-royal/en/

That’s all for now, Ben

Travel Photo of the Week

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Photo by popsugar.com.

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Foundations of a Great Company – Microsoft

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Company Name: Microsoft

Ticker Symbol: MSFT

Founders: Bill Gates, Paul Allen

CEO: Satya Nadella

Honestly, I’m not much of a Microsoft person. I’d prefer to have everything Apple. But looking at some of the company information I started to realize how great of a company it is.3ec2fc1e-697f-416f-b75b-5bd2638f9110_22.png

Microsoft was founded on April 4th 1975 by Bill Gates (You’ve probably heard of him) and Paul Allen. In 2013 Bill Gates was one of the richest people on earth. Microsoft is known for their computers but the also make tablets, smart watches, and phones. As of 2016 Microsoft had 118 584 employees and was worth $438.98 billion which really shows how large it is. Some of Microsofts subsidiaries include Skype technologies (Skype), Nokia, Mojang (Minecraft), and over 100 others. The CEO, Satya Nadella, was born in India on August 19th 1967. He learned electrical engineering in India and he learned about computers and business in the U.S. Microsofts annual revenue is $93 580 000 000 and it has over $176 Billion in assets. Microsoft has an awesome logo which is important in any industry and has some great products. Microsoft is in charge of Microsoft Word which I use constantly. They’re also in charge of Bing which is almost as good as Google. If I were you I’d definitely invest in Microsoft right away!

That’s all for now, Ben

 

 

Proxy

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When you buy a stock you’re not allowed to have any say in company matters whatsoever  (Just Kidding). When you buy stocks you actually have a lot of say in company matters. You get to vote on something called the BOD (Board of Directors). The BOD gets to decide who the CEO will be and have the opportunity to hire top company managers. The more stocks you own the more you get to vote, so a person with one stock gets one vote, while a person with 500 sticks gets 500 votes. Every year all shareholders in a business are sent something called a proxy (although sometimes it’s sent to you online). Usually this proxy comes with an annual report and information on the Annual Shareholders Meeting, a meeting where the shareholders and people like the CEO meet to discuss important company events and communicate accomplishments and challenges from the last year. It’s kind of like the annual report but in person. If you live anywhere near where this is held you should definitely consider going. Anyways, when you get your proxy ballot you get a list of about ten people who are running for the BOD. You then get the choice to vote for them, against them, or abstain your vote (Pretty much means you chose not to vote). Most people vote for everyone on the list but some do a lot of research to decide who will benefit the company and who won’t.

Yesterday I got my proxy ballot from Mattel so I thought it would be the perfect the time to  write about Proxy’s.

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It looks kind of boring but some proxy’s look like this.

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Also kind of boring (I never said they were supposed to be interesting).

That’s all for now, Ben

 

Travel Photo of the Week

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Photo by highenoughtoseethesea on Tumblr

 

 

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Long-Term Debt

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Debt! An extremely scary word. Debt is what a company owes to another company. Generally this means that someone (usually a bank) gave them money with the expectation that they will pay back the money within a certain time frame. Lot’s of companies have debt, and a little bit of it is okay but a lot can be dangerous. Always look at the amount of debt a company has before investing. Try comparing the debt to other things like total assets and last years sales to see if the business could easily pay it off quickly. Debt is just another one of those things you’ve got to learn about before investing.

That’s all for now, Ben

Get to Know the CEO

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The CEO (Chief Executive Officer) of any business is definitely the most important person involved in the success of that company. They’re responsible for almost all big business moves and have control over the entire company. When you find a corporation you’d like to invest in, you’ve got to learn everything you can about the CEO. This can include simple things like their name and age but also stuff like their education and previous occupations, which can have a huge effect on how they run their company. Below is a checklist of the minimum things you should learn about the CEO before investing in their company.

  • Name
  • Age & Birth
  • Birthplace and Where they were Raised
  • Education (University education is the most important.)
  • Previous Occupations
  • Accomplishments
  •  And Other Qualification as CEO

That’s all for now, Ben

Travel Photo of the Week

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8ebbb9258f3d4b6d2ae86a031ebcf293Photo by rubinphoto on Flickr