What is GDP? (CNBC on YouTube and their explainer videos)

I find myself watching a lot of these interesting videos on the YouTube channel of CNBC. In this video it explains what GDP is. If you finished college you probably had this lesson already but if you didn't go in the field of finance or marketing you probably wouldn't care much about this. Truth is I still don't and it does seem lacking in terms of tracking the real growth of the regular citizen in a country. I'll talk in general because I'm not smart enough to really understand this but while 3rd world countries in Asia seem to be growing in GDP the poverty gap is also growing. This might just be a measurement of those people affected by these numbers. It doesn't look at those people in the gray area of the economy those below the poverty line and those who are unemployed. I think Bhutan even measure the gross happiness of it's citizens as part of its economic data. I believe this is the more important statistic to measure.

Solving Problems Through Connected Minds

It's always easier to see the bad over the good, black over white. For the older generation especially, the internet seems to bring so much negativity these days especially with the proliferation of fake stuff - fake news and fake lives on Instagram. But we forget to look at how these new connections via the internet and social media has created a pace of innovation we have never seen before. A lot of opportunities have been created just by being adept on being on the internet and social media - thus the creation of the nomadic lifestyle giving a lot of people the life of travel and mobility that can only be imagined a few decades ago.

Below is a video of sample where people over the internet solved problems together.

Jollibee, the Pride of the Philippines

I just recently studied and invested into the stock market. The most basic suggestion depending on what your goals were was to invest into the blue chip stocks. Since I didn't have much money to place into stock I am only able to choose a few stocks and Jollibee is one of the stocks I chose. Here are some of the reasons I chose this stock:

1. Brand recall. They are the most dominant quick serve restaurant (QSR) chain in the Philippines today is one of a few local companies with a vision to go global.
2. As mentioned, they are going global. They have already purchased several local companies like Mang Inasal and Chowking. They are slowly opening branches where there are a huge number of Filipinos abroad. They have recently purchase some foreign brands. At that time I bought into the market Smash Burgers were one of the purchases. A week or so ago the bought Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf.
3. I am a consumer of their products. While McDonald's is my go to fast food I would eat Chicken Joy and Chowking is a favorite as well.
4. Since I have no plans of playing the market JFC (as listed in the stock exchange) was a logical pick.

My stock picks were doing great for the first six months until Jollibee started pulling it down by a few percentage points. After doing some research (Google) it seems the purchases didn't look that good since these companies were essentially bleeding. But as the articles pointed out, it's hard to purchase companies that are doing well and as a growth strategy to get foothold in different global markets you have to make strategic moves that can move the company forward in the future while taking short term losses.

After doing research in the stock market and given that my investment in Jollibee is a long term play, I still believe it's a good stock pick. Since I didn't know how to read the market my timing probably wasn't the best. As a first timer though, I believe that he who hesitates loose. If I didn't invest in stock at that time I probably wouldn't ever. If I had more money, now may be a good time to buy since it's down.

Here's a video about Jollibee.