Senior Anthony Sobonya finished in second place in the Ohio Stock Market Challenge in December.
Sobonya competed against teams from other schools across Northeast Ohio as one of twelve people from Independence, most of them in the Stock Market I class. The goal of the challenge was to make the most amount of money. The contest began on October 6 and concluded on December 12. Sobonya won a prize of $100 for placing second, ending with a portfolio value of $113,573.42. Sobonya’s victory is the tenth time IHS has placed in the top three.
Sobonya reigned in first place for weeks eight and nine of the competition, landing second after the tenth week. “My strategy for the competition was to invest in the cheaper stocks,” Sobonya said, “because within ten weeks they have the highest possibility of going up in a short amount of time.”
“Anthony was very active in it; he monitored it a lot,” business teacher Ms. Micki Dotson said. “He paid attention. He was vigilant and that paid off.”
The Ohio Stock Market Challenge is an online simulation of the stock market in which students invest in different companies. The contest also serves as a valuable learning tool about how the stock market operates for those who want to try investing someday. “From this challenge, I learned how the stock market works, and how to smartly invest in the future,” Sobonya said.
One of the key takeaways from the challenge was that it is “hard to profit in the stock market. Nobody knows what’s going to happen,” Dotson said. “It’s hard to predict what the market is going to do.”
Sophomore Maya Toth commented, “The state of stocks are changing literally every second.”
Next semester’s Stock Market I class will participate in another Ohio Stock Market Challenge beginning in February and ending in April.
