Investor starts young, shares tips
Teen-ager turns gift for good grades into $500,000

Lawrence K. Ho / Los Angeles Times David Leung advises teen-agers to develop the habit of saving and investing early in life.

By Susan Carpenter / Los Angeles Times

    LOS ANGELES -- David Leung was 10 when, as a reward for good grades, his parents began a yearly tradition of giving him 100 shares of stock. Seven years later, his portfolio is worth about $500,000.
    A math whiz and aspiring computer scientist, Leung bought into a company he thought showed promise -- Microsoft. Since then, he's put almost every dollar he's earned from part-time work into his portfolio, which includes a few other select stocks.
    Now he is helping teach other teens and twentysomethings about investment through two Web sites, Investing for Kids (http://library.thinkquest.org/3096), which he founded at age 13, and Invest Smart (http://library.thinkquest.org/10326), a site that teaches money management skills and includes a real-time stock investment game used in more than 9,000 schools nationwide.
    "The goal was just to teach other youngsters the concepts of saving and investing and not wasting all their money," says Leung, a senior at nearby Palos Verdes Peninsula High.
    The primary concept he teaches is simple, if elusive, to more consumer-oriented kids his age: Spend less to have money to invest. "It doesn't matter how much you save," he says, "as long as you get in the habit."
    Leung puts his money where his mouth is. He works part time as a programming consultant to an e-commerce site and invests everything he makes.
    All of it.
    "I don't really see that many movies. I don't really buy any clothes. I just do stuff like tennis that doesn't cost money," he says.
    And he encourages other teen-agers to do the same. Instead of spending money at the movies or in the mall, Leung suggests they "give up the night out" and "buy clothes on sale."
    Leung believes you're never too young to start planning for the future. It's a refrain he often hears from people who say they wish they had known about his Web site and invested earlier.