The Stocks I’d Buy If I Were 18 Again

by Graham Lindman | May 13, 2026

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How young traders and investors should think about allocation strategy isn’t addressed nearly enough, and I know we have some younger traders around here…

And plenty of you have kids or nephews and nieces who might be interested in getting into at least buying and holding stocks for the long term.

When I was recently speaking with some high school students about investing, it got me thinking about what I wish I’d known at their age.

If I could go back to their age, I would try to save up as much money as I can over time. Maybe that’s $100 a month. The amount isn’t what matters most — it’s the commitment to putting money to work and having a plan for where it should go.

Starting early means every dollar you save has years to grow and compound, and it’s hard to put a price tag on something like that because it could be huge down the line.

The Risk-On Approach for Young Investors

I can’t tell anyone what to do with their money because I’m not a financial adviser, but I can share what my personal approach would be. If I’m around 18, I would lean toward risk-on assets — tech stocks, Nasdaq 100 (QQQ) stocks and AI plays.

Not in a reckless way but in a way that recognizes the advantage of having decades ahead of you. Markets will spill at some point, and you will probably sit through a 50% drawdown one day. But there’s also a real chance many AI and tech names will be up 500% over the next decade.

That said, risk-on doesn’t mean going all in. Everyone has a different number they can truly afford to lose. A simple gut check helps — before you put money into a trade, imagine it went to $0. If that thought makes you queasy, you’re over-allocating. Respect that feeling and size down. Market swings are normal, prices move and the goal is to stay calm enough to stick to your plan.

Even experienced traders can learn this lesson the hard way. I’ve had a trade where everything lined up perfectly and I still over-allocated. I took an $80,000 loss — the biggest of my life — and the worst part is that if I had simply stuck with the original plan, the trade would have worked because the stock rebounded after I cut my losses.

That’s why managing your size matters.

The Long-Term Play

One of the most powerful things you can do when you’re young is embrace systematic, rules-based investing. When you have structure, you remove the emotional chaos that leads to bad decisions. Dollar cost averaging, or following a simple repeatable strategy, often outperforms trying to shoot from the hip.

And don’t feel like you need to master everything at once. Start with one approach that fits your schedule and personality. Get really good at that before you branch out.

Depth beats dabbling, especially in the beginning.

To show the power of long-term patience, consider a simple scenario: If someone had put money into QQQ every year since birth and never touched it, that account could grow into something huge over 18 years. Sometimes boring consistency is the real superpower — buy something you believe will grow over time, like an index fund for instance, and let compounding do the heavy lifting.

The biggest key is patience. Don’t try to make a thousand bucks overnight. Let it ride. Give your investments years to work instead of reacting to every short-term move.

The same applies to your career — find what you love, pursue it fully and don’t panic if it takes time. Growth compounds in life just like it does in your account.

Graham Lindman
Graham Lindman Trading

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