When Jasper Gould of Brooklyn, New York, was in seventh grade, he started wondering what Wall Street was all about. He googled it, read some analysis and a book called “The Intelligent Investor,” and rounded up a few thousand dollars from gifts, family members, some work at home and at a summer camp. Then, through a custodial investment account managed by his dad, he bought some stocks.“As someone who played video games, I understood what Nvidia was at a very surface level, so that excited me,” Gould explained. He bought Intel, Microsoft, and Amazon, too. “I remember checking my portfolio about a year after, probably eighth grade, and I think it was up 66% that year, which was, you know, pretty significantly strong,” he said.Now, Gould is a junior in high school, and co-founder of the Brooklyn Youth Charitable Investment Group. He and a couple of hundred teens interested in learning about investing research and pitch stocks, invest donated contributions in those stocks, and then donate returns.“We can make an impact on the world, and we can still do the thing that we're really interested in,” he said.As for his personal portfolio, Gould said by the time he’s in his early twenties, it could potentially be a “life-altering sum of money.”“It’s very possible that, you know, the money I've made from profiting off of artificial intelligence and its advancement in the stock market could, in fact, bail me out from any career troubles down the line that result from artificial intelligence and its invention,” he said.Such financial uncertainty is one of the reasons why Jonathan Craig, head of retail investing at Charles Schwab (full disclosure, a Marketplace underwriter) thinks teens are interested in the markets.”This generation recognizes that they're growing up in an environment where home ownership is incredibly expensive. Education is expensive. There's a little bit of job uncertainty,” Craig said. “And I think there's a recognition that if financial independence is important, investing is going to have to be a big part of it.”Charles Schwab recently introduced investor accounts specifically for teens. Like a custodial account, these teen accounts still require a parent or guardian to get started. But, instead of needing that adult to complete a trade, a teen can do it on their own. That said, there are some guardrails.“They can't use leverage. No derivatives. No futures. No forex,” Craig explained.Parents can see what their teens are up to. And it’s entirely possible that the kids may lose money, which is an important lesson, too. These teen accounts join a number of investing options available to young people. Greenlight, a money management and education app, gives parents the option to approve kids’ proposed trades. Fidelity, another Marketplace underwriter, also offers “Youth Accounts” for teen investors. And lots of institutions, from Vanguard to Merrill, offer custodial accounts.Carly Urban, an economics professor at Montana State University, said it makes sense for companies to introduce their products to young potential customers and to get their parents signed up, too. But she points out that not everyone will be able to take advantage.“It’s probably going to be the parents with more resources and who trust financial systems, who probably are already investors, who are going to be all for this,” Urban said.While some financial institutions have published their own studies touting the popularity of investing among youth, Urban said it’s difficult to know for sure how teens feel about the economy and how many are actually investing. There just aren’t that many big, consistent surveys focused on minors.Though Urban said that there are other indicators of potential interest among young people: Youth, she noted, are a big force behind the push for personal finance education in schools. And participation in a competition called the Stock Market Game is up more than 35% compared to 2016.“So there are a lot of different ways that we're seeing kids be involved,” Urban said.Alisa Chang, a senior at Valencia High School in Placentia, California, said her dad used to bring up stocks and investing at dinner, so she set out to learn what he was talking about. She attended an investing bootcamp, entered investing challenges and simulations, and tapped into education resources from the Young Investors Society, a nonprofit focused on financial literacy and investing skills. Then started analyzing stocks herself.She had some Starbucks in her portfolio (she liked the drinks), and after researching the fintech company Futu Holdings, she worked with her dad to buy some of their stock, too. She said she’d seen “pretty good” growth.“I started off with a lack of confidence at first, and I feel like I will resonate with a lot of people at my school, maybe especially the girls who … we don't talk about this at all,” Chang said.She even started a chapter of the Young Investors Society at her school, with 20-some members.“We try to share as much knowledge into, you know, the basics and how you can start analyzing,” she said.And now, she said, she finds it “heartwarming” that she can discuss stocks with her dad at the dinner table.