Request for Startup: Codecademy for Stocks

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Feb 06, 12 Request for Startup: Codecademy for Stocks

Like any tech startup and the community at large, we’re heavily invested in the future. And, we’re excited about it. We were doubly so when we came across Codecademy. In case you haven’t heard of it, it’s a platform that teaches people with no programming experience how to code in a fun and interactive way.

About a month ago, they launched ‘Code Year’. The idea is that people make their 2012 New Year’s Resolution, learning to code. Codecademy teaches users through weekly exercises that become increasingly in-depth. Code Year launched barely a month ago and already over 380,000 people have signed up! It’s awesome!

The success of Codecademy’s interactive approach got me thinking: there’s no equivalent for learning about the stock market. There’s no fun, interactive way to learn how to invest your money. Financial education is vital and it’s something that definitely doesn’t get enough attention. The old model of financial advisors, mutual fund managers and brokers is dying fast. Individual investors are taking control of their financial future in droves, and the more resources they have to learn from, the better. So, here’s my request for a startup: Codecademy for Stocks.

To do this well, it would have to be a highly incremental learning process, holding user’s hands step-by-step. You could probably put lessons into video format, similar to the Khan Academy videos (link), and then quiz users giving them points and badges for getting answers rights. Gradually, they’d work their way up from learning basic definitions and terminology to picking an investment philosophy to completing stock valuations. Eventually, they’d open up their own discount brokerage account (an opportunity to monetize them) and be completely able to manage their own portfolio. You could literally take them from Wall Street Zero to Wall Street Hero.

At Vuru, we’re super passionate about empowering individual investors and if you’re interested in building Codecademy for Stocks, we’d love to help out in any way we can. Feel free to reach out to me if you’d like to discuss this further: yoseph at vuru.co.

Here’s to a future where financial education is standard and Wall Street no longer has the gall to call us “dumb money”.

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This post was written by Yoseph West, co-founder and CEO of Vuru.