Te Kahukura Boyton, also known as Māori Millionaire, is on a mission to get rangatahi Māori thinking about their finances.
It was through her upbringing that she claims her whānau were at a disadvantage when it came to wages that started her interest in finance.
"Growing up, I always saw everyone working really hard around me. My mum was a school teacher. She was always busy at mahi and I didn't see the financial reward that she was able to get out of her doing that."
And it was through this experience that led Boyton to read about financial literacy.
"I really loved reading pukapuka and I read a lot of personal finance books and learnt about different aspects of personal finance, like investing and growing money."
The 18-year-old rangatahi from Hawke's Bay is currently studying law, but she's also an entrepreneur and content creator.
"We are naturally entrepreneurs. And so, you know, even back in the day, we would trade, you know, māra kai trading for meats and things like that. And so if we're able to re-indigenise our whakaaro about how we live, then I think we can change our trajectory from being living in poverty to living prosperous lives."
Her business is called Māori Millionaire, and earlier this month she had a workshop about finance held at Community Waitākere in west Auckland.
"I think there's this general idea that being a millionaire is the goal and all of these books that I've read and the thing that was left out of them was this indigenous person or this indigenous millionaire that, you know, I wanted to look up to, which I couldn't find," Boyton said
"So my goal with Māori Millionaire is to start a conversation with lots of people and to have these open conversations about pūtea."
Boyton invests her money into the stock market. She said it's been a humbling yet rewarding journey - her goal is wanting to become financially stable and independent while inspiring other Māori whānau as well.
"I've been doing this kaupapa for a while now by investing my money and I'm not a millionaire yet. But if we're able to do small things every day consistently, then we're going to be able to have a positive future."
Made with support from Te Māngai Pāho and the Public Interest Journalism Fund.
