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Correction: In an earlier publication of this article, Sydney Skarbek’s name was misspelled. We regret the error and are happy to correct it.

NILES — Stuart Lundberg is thinking big picture.
Every day, Lundberg checks the stock market standings after the market opens in the morning, and makes sure to check the news and how the markets have responded after his classes end.
His interest in the stock market began before last Christmas, when his wish list included buying a stock.
“I got a share of Uber, and some other stocks, and a custodial account,” Lundberg said. “For the past few months, I’ve been buying more stocks.”
He found more information on investments and stock trading from watching YouTube videos and checking out books from the library.
“During the summer, I wanted to start a club so we could have an investing club, and I could teach other people,” he said.
The Niles High School junior and three friends are participating in this year’s Husky Investment Tournament for High Schools from Michigan Tech University.
Lundberg’s teammates are fellow Vikings. The team is made up of Lundberg, his brother Sawyer Lundberg, ninth grade, Maggie Chisonga and Sydney Skarbek, both seniors.
According to the MTU website, “teams comprised of three of our students will receive $1,000,000 in virtual U.S. dollars to build a portfolio. At the conclusion of the competition, the team with the top-performing portfolio will be invited to campus to pitch to a panel of current Michigan Tech students and experts.”
In addition to the pitch, students on the winning team will also be awarded in $1,000 prize money to split. All participating students receive a one-time scholarship of $1,000 to MTU.
“There are 44 teams participating,” Lundberg said.
The clubs are mainly located throughout Michigan, but according to the MTU website, there are some teams from Maryland and Florida as well.
“We’ve been trading a few different stocks,” Lundberg said. “Some marijuana stocks, some tech stocks, and then some blue-chip stocks. We’ve been focused on the election.”
As a part of the program through MTU, the teams are provided educational videos each week to learn about different parts of investment. The first few videos have featured students from MTU.
“They have lessons about why stocks go up and down, and they talk about the vocabulary, and different types of trading, like short selling,” Lundberg said. “They’re really informative.”
The competition began on Sept. 28.
“We’ve been focused on the election as one fo the ways to make money,” he said.
Lundberg said he watched the stock market crash not long ago due to a tweet by the president.
“We’re up 1 percent, so we’ve made around $11,000,” Lundberg said of the competitions virtual currency.
On the official Fall 2020 Husky Investment Tournament Standings from the week of Oct. 5, the Niles High School team was in third place, with $1,003,030.27, an increase from the $1,000,000 the team started with. In second place for the week was Father Gabriel Richard High School from Ann Arbor, Michigan, and in first was Houghton High School, from Houghton, Michigan.
The competition is seven weeks long.