Advice for

young people

often sounds deceptively simple: think big, start small, recognize that different people have different needs, be patient and don’t be afraid to put yourself out there.

What’s striking is how naturally those principles

extend to investing

. Too many people believe that

successful portfolios

are built on large sums, making huge bets, getting lucky breaks or perfect timing. But the

foundations of long‑term wealth

— just like the foundations of a meaningful career — are built from small steps that compound over time.

One of the best illustrations of this truth doesn’t come from finance, but from one of the

most creative feats of persistence

I’ve ever seen: the story of Kyle MacDonald, better known as the man who traded a single red paperclip all the way up to a house.

On July 14, 2005, he made his first trade: a red paperclip for a fish‑shaped pen. At first glance, the exchange feels almost comical in its insignificance. But later that same day, he traded the pen for a hand‑sculpted doorknob, opening, quite literally, the door to his next opportunity.

From there, MacDonald’s journey took off in ways no one could have predicted. He swapped the doorknob for a Coleman camp stove, then traded the stove for a Honda generator. The generator was transformed into what he called an “instant party” — a keg, an IOU for beer and a neon Budweiser sign.

That party was traded for a Ski‑Doo snowmobile, which, in turn, became a two‑person trip to Yahk, B.C. He then traded one of the spots on that trip for a box truck, his first truly utilitarian asset, but he didn’t stop there.

The truck became a recording contract, which then became a year’s rent in Phoenix, which he traded for an afternoon with Alice Cooper. Then came his strangest trade of all: Cooper’s afternoon for a motorized KISS snow globe.

Somehow, MacDonald saw value where most would not and he was right. He leveraged that snow globe into a movie role. After 14 trades in a bit less than a year, he traded that movie role on July 5, 2006, for a two‑storey farmhouse in Kipling, Sask. The town offered it up by using his profile as a marketing ploy to put itself on the map and host open auditions for the film. It was, by every measure, a win-win.

On the surface, this tale is a quirky piece of human‑interest trivia. But beneath it lies a profound investment lesson: big outcomes often emerge from small, almost laughable beginnings.

MacDonald didn’t start with capital; he started with creativity, curiosity and the ability to recognize value in the strangest places. More importantly, he had the discipline to keep moving forward even when the incremental gains looked trivial. Each trade didn’t need to be life‑changing; it just needed to be a slight upgrade. Those small upgrades compounded into something extraordinary.

The same pattern appears again and again in wealth building.

New investors

often feel they lack enough to begin. They think they need a large lump sum, specialized knowledge or a perfect entry point. They see headlines about $1-billion deals and parabolic stock moves, and assume investing is reserved for people who are already far ahead. But every experienced investor knows the truth:

portfolios are not built on leaps

, they’re built on steps.

A first $100 contribution to a

tax-free savings account

may feel insignificant. A one per cent monthly gain may seem unremarkable. Setting aside automatic deposits may feel routine. But these small actions accumulate faster than most people realize and they compound year over year into something meaningful. Over decades, they can become transformative, helping establish both financial stability and the disciplines that support it.

The people who succeed aren’t the ones who wait for ideal conditions. They’re the ones who start trading their own version of paperclips, whatever that may be. Perhaps the most powerful lesson in MacDonald’s story is this: he wasn’t afraid to put himself out there.

Many young investors hesitate to start because they feel exposed, often paralyzed by the fear of choosing where and how to start, making mistakes, asking naive questions or beginning too small to impress anyone. But that humility is precisely what builds great portfolios

and

great lives.

In the end, the greatest investment decision you’ll ever make is simply the decision to begin.

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Martin Pelletier, CFA, is a senior portfolio manager at Wellington-Altus Private Counsel Inc., operating as TriVest Wealth Counsel, a private client and institutional investment firm specializing in discretionary risk-managed portfolios, investment audit/oversight and advanced tax, estate and wealth planning. The opinions expressed are not necessarily those of Wellington-Altus.

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