That is sad. It's sad to see a young kid get pulled in and manipulated by shady marketing into trading on margin.
In 9th grade, after the WWI unit, Mrs Hedlund, our history teacher set up a stock market and allowed everyone to trade on 10% margin. I actually started out with the least amount of money. Having little to lose, I bought the cheapest stock and traded on max margin until a big run up gave me a nice pile of money in stock. I cashed out and bought the blue chips. Others, seeing my success, purchased the growth stock on margin... despite the fact that we were by now starting to study the Great Depression. Hello kids! Of course, we got to the Crash of 1929 and all the people on margin were wiped out.
Even though I ended up as the richest in the class, it was pretty clear even at 14 that was the result of luck and a gamble one should not take with real money. Thanks Mrs Hedlund. Lesson learned. It was great pedagogy.
The flip side to this is a family I know has kept on their feet as business has declined. The wife (a careful, savvy, smart person) has been making more day trading on the volatility of the market than they were making doing their other work before Covid. She's been day trading for a long time as a supplement and then primary income, so she has a lot of experience. For those who know what they're doing, all the volatility has been a boon.
For me, I have not purchased an individual stock for a day trade or a long trade since the last century.
