I'm a pre-university/college Australian student who has recently (last 2 months) come across the idea of investing. I have amassed around $1000 of entirely spendable money as I have no debts or living expenses (still at school, living at home). After reading numerous articles online about the concept of investing, the structure of the market, etc. I have found myself at somewhat of loss as to what direction to turn to for my very first investment.
My primary questions is related to the types of investment vehicles (methods of investing money to turn a profit) and their strengths/weaknesses as they apply to my situation. I have read that ETF's are quite a good starting point due to their ability to track indexes and therefore keep high levels of stability. Specifically, I have noticed Vanguard as a possible fund to look at. Can anyone verify that ETF's (specifically Vanguard) would be the best investment option for me? If it is the case that ETF's are not the best method of investing my money at this point in time, could someone point me in the right direction towards a better investment option?
I'm sorry if this sounds like the ramblings of a novice, but as I'm sure you all can sympathize there is a stupid amount of conflicting and constantly changing information about this subject on the internet and because of this I'm struggling to find consistent information. Hopefully I can get a reasonably coherent answer from someone here at StackExchange.
Thanks in advance!