Help investment ideas please? which are safe? how do they work? is there a holding period.?

Investment plans?
i am looking to do some investing here real soon, if possible, im 19 and i would like to make the money i have last longer than it should, i want to get maybe a bond or an ira, im not sure, dont rele know what they are and cant find anything to FULLY EXPLAIN what they are and the penalties. i will be investing alot of money. but i also wanna be able to get the money back if i need it. i am currently in college and dont need so much right now, i wont be buying a house or anything anytime soon even after college but i will be probly within the next few years maybe 5, i wanna do some international volunteering first. i wanna do something easy and risk free if possible. i like the idea of stocks, but i dont know ANYTHING about them. any ideas?

You can open an IRA account if you earn wages. Up to $4000, but the account is for retirement and you do not have access to the funds without a penalty until age 59 1/2.

The safest and shorted investments that I know of are t-bills. The most popular varieties are 3 month and 6 month. The government sells them every Monday. They currently pay about 5% maybe a little more. They actually pay better than most longer term bonds currently, but that may not continue. What I mean by 3 and 6 month is that the government pays them off every 3 and 6 months. And if you want to reinvest the money you can then buy new t-bills. You can also sell them in the secondary market if you need the money prior to that, but there will be a brokerage commission on the sale. They are very liquid, actually better than cash. You can buy them directly from the government. Here is the link.

http://www.treasurydirect.gov/RI/OFBills

You can also buy them thru Fidelity at the Monday auction without a broker commission. Fidelity is the only broker I know of that does that without a commission.

But the book "Investing for Dummies". That will get up to speed on the various options you have.

If your leaving the country and won't be able to watch your money take it to a professional. You want it in stocks and bonds if you want to make real money.

The easiest way to invest in the stock market is with what are called exchange traded funds. These are essentially mutual funds that are traded on exchanges like stocks, and allow you to own a little stock in a lot of companies very easily. This saves you the trouble of researching individual stocks and does away with the chance of you accidentally investing in another Enron. There are a lot of different ETFs that invest in different assets, but two that hold the stocks in the S&P 500 (an index of the 500 largest US stocks) are the iShares fund (IVV) and the SPDR fund (SPY).

To invest all you have to do is open a brokerage account. You can do it online-- just go to www.scottrade.com, www.tradeking.com. There are a lot of other ones, though I recommend that you read the fine print before tossing in your money.

Hi...best investment

Invest in Yourself!
Start marketing your own skills and talents..you might as well because it sounds like you are going to end up in a job.

What is a job? "Just Over Broke"

If you want to be hands off..and let the money make money..
go and see a financial advisor, who can suggest where to invest.

Don't put all the eggs in one basket.

Learn to make money with your money:
you need to educate yourself in money

Buy books and learn...

Put money into ADRs of fast growing Indian companies like Infosys etc. You stand to gain a lot in next 3-4 years.

If you will be needing your invested money back in 5 years time, it is best that you invest in insurance. There are several US dollar investment plans being offered by Philamlife, Insular Life etc. which earns from 10-20% for 5-year period free of tax.

This type of investment is secured compared to stock investments.

Hello Ryan:

Email me at bhaskarkdas@gmail.com will tell you what to do and how to do it dont go looking around please its my request.
I know what I am saying

Regards