Teenager inspires low-income students to strive for strong financial futures

Ely Hahami, 16, witnessed the poverty that affects New York communities and felt inspired to create change in the Bronx and Harlem, where he played basketball.

Investing in Your Story provides access, resources, and instruction on financial literacy in the hope those accessing workshops will use their newfound knowledge to break cyclical poverty.

The organisation, formed last winter, collaborated with community groups Inspiring Young Minds and the Academics Basketball Community of the Riverside Church, to host a three-hour workshop for struggling middle school students in Harlem.

Ely, who runs the Investment Club at the Lawrenceville School, said: “The session was designed to help prepare teenagers for stronger financial futures of investing and show them how they can grow an income to mitigate the effects of intergenerational poverty.

“Financial literacy is only one piece of the puzzle, but we, as a society, have to start building much stronger financial foundations for long-term success.

“Many minority communities don’t have access to banking resources and are often subject to unfavourable rates and fees. We, as teens, are ones who have to make change within our own communities for economic empowerment.”

Students who attended learned how to use stock sectors to diversify a portfolio, how to understand financial terms such as PE ratios as well as the causes of inflation.

They were also shown how to research and analyse historical returns of major companies, such as Amazon, Nike and Tesla – and even got the chance to dabble in a MarketWatch game where they could buy and track stocks with virtual cash.