Stock Investing Basics Articles
What Is Day Trading?
Day trading is the practice of buying and selling securities, currencies and other financial instruments within the same trading day.
Ex-Dividend Date and Record Date Explained
Knowing ex-dividend dates, record dates, declaration dates, and payable dates is an important component of crafting an investing strategy.
Convertible Securities Definition and Types
Convertible securities are securities that may be converted from bonds or preferred stocks to (usually) common stocks.
Closing Price Discrepancies
Closing prices are essential information and an important component of making investment decisions.
Variable Annuity Contracts Explained
Variable annuities are annuity products that you may purchase from insurance companies. Learn about these investment vehicles.
Hedge Funds 101: Introduction to Hedge Fund Investing
Different hedge funds mean different investment strategies and market focus. Investing successfully on the hedge fund market requires that an investor should understand the basic differences and blends of the different hedge fund strategies.
Investment Planning 101 – Getting Started on Investing
Investing in securities may be a game – but only for people who can afford to lose a lot of money or veterans who play the securities investment game expertly. This article will teach you the steps you must accomplish if you are a new and inexperienced investor.
What Investors Need to Know about Financial Analysts
Most investors rely heavily on financial analysts reports and recommendations about securities. Therefore, there are certain things you should know about them.
What Are Financial Analysts?
Financial analysts are research analysts that study the performance of publicly traded companies in the exchange market. They make their recommendations public, and investors often base their trading decisions on their ratings.
Understanding Mutual Companies
There are many banks, savings associations and insurance companies in the U.S. that are organized as mutual companies.
Auditing Essentials
What exactly is the purpose of auditing, who does it and what do investors need to know about it? Read this article to find out.
Understanding Trade Execution
What happens when you place your order to buy or sell stock? Is the trade immediately executed? Where does that happen, how, and what is your broker’s role in the process. These are questions that every investor should know the answers to.
How to Read Stock Tables
Knowing how to read stock tables and understanding the investment quotes is an investing basic and essential for your investment success.
Why Do Companies Go Public
To go public means that you have to list the company on a stock exchange and offer stock to the public. The money you get from the stock sale is known as initial public offering.
Price to Earnings (P/E) Ratio Basics
One of the most widely used ratios is the P/E ratio (price/earnings). Despite some of its disadvantages, it is favored by most investors for its easy of understanding and calculating.
Price to Earnings Growth Ratio (PEG) Explanation
High growth rates are one of the factors that greatly attract investors to a particular stock. As a result of the increased attention, the price of the stock may hit the skies. A ratio that manages to explain this attention is the price/earnings growth ratio (PEG).
Understanding Inventory Turnover Ratio
You should compare the turnover ratios of companies in order to determine their efficiency of inventory management.
Understanding Return on Equity and Return on Assets
Two ratios that are usually used in order to measure management efficiency are return on equity (ROE) and return on assets (ROA).
Price/Book Value Advantages and Disadvantages
Price/book value is best applicable to companies that have many tangible assets, banks and insurance companies.
Importance of Current Assets and Current Liabilities
When you study the figures of a target company it is worth examining its current assets and current liabilities.
Technical Analysis Basics
Technical analysts tend to use different mathematical techniques in order to predict future trends in the prices of a target stock.
Fundamental Analysis Technique Basics
In order to make an analysis of target stocks, you can choose from a number of tools. One of them is the fundamental analysis technique.
Stock Price Volatility
Stock prices are characterized by volatility. When significant changes occur, investors tend to panic.
Introduction to Stocks
Stock represents a piece of ownership of a particular company. Though stock investing carries a certain degree of risk, it can be very profitable for an educated investor.
Stock Market Investing Basics
Learn the basics in investing in the stock market in order to understand how the stock market works.
Consumer Price Index Basics
CPI stands for Consumer Price Index. It is commonly referred to as a measure of the rate of inflation.
Option Basics and Types
Some investors tend to sign option contracts, which include the right to buy or sell securities when a certain price is reached. There are two major types of options.
IPO Basics and Strategies
Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) represent the transition point of companies from a private status to a publicly held status. Thus, IPOs represent a new trading opportunity.
CPI Basics
The most well known and widely quoted economic indicator is the CPI (Consumer Price Index). It represents an estimation of the change in prices of consumer goods and services.
Earnings Season Basics
Earnings season represents the time when many companies give a report on their quarterly profits or losses. Thus, this term is often mentioned during the year.
Stock Market Movements
The stock market is characterized by its volatility. What exactly causes its rises and falls has several explanations. Some of them are obvious whereas others are not so easily determined.
Asset Allocation Basics
In order to protect your assets from sustaining losses when a sector suffers a decline you should practice asset allocation, meaning you spread your resources among different categories of investments.
Foreign Stocks Basics
As part of your investment portfolio you should not overlook foreign stocks. Depending on your conservativeness regarding investing include the appropriate percentage of foreign stocks in your portfolio.
Rising Interest Rates and their Effects
Changes in interest rates may have influence over the performance of companies. This in turn may reflect on the movement of your stocks.
Advance Decline Ratio Basics
One of the indicators that give you an idea on what has happened during the trading day is advance/decline ratio. Use advance/decline numbers whenever you need to make a judgment on the performance of the market.
Stock Price Influences
Stock prices are vulnerable to many market changes. You should become familiar with these influences in order to be able to identify whether the change in the price gives you a signal to sell, buy or do nothing with a particular stock.
Trailing Stop Order Basics
Trailing stop orders are a form of stop loss orders. Their major purpose is to protect the profit from a stock. If used appropriately, trailing stops can follow an increasing price of a stock.
Stop Loss Order Fundamentals
Stop loss orders are used to alleviate the losses that may be incurred if the price of your stocks falls under the desired level. Under this type of order the broker is required to sell the stock when a certain level is hit.
Newspaper and Online Stock Quotes
Your successful participation on the stock market depends on many factors one of which is the clear understanding of the numbers that are daily quoted by the different sources.
Setting Stock Prices
The setting of stock prices depends on many factors. It is not a simple process, but instead a complex one which, however, is easy to understand.
Stock Order Types
Using the services on online brokers includes familiarization with the different types of orders that are in use for the execution of the various trades by investors.
Company Market Capitalization
When you decide on the investment in a particular stock you should consider the size of the company that issues it. This is required since companies of different sizes react in a different way to market conditions and changes.
NYSE and Market Specialists
The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) is the oldest stock exchange in the US. The key role in NASDAQ is played by a market maker, whereas in the NYSE it is allocated for a specialist, who is a market professional part of a specialist firm.
Market Makers Role and Responsibilities
The role of the market maker is clearly identified in the NASDAQ. Market makers at NASDAQ are responsible for the provision of a market for the listed securities and the provided prices (both ask and bid prices).
Stock Trading Basics and Order Types
Trading is facilitated by many additional tools that minimize the possibility of disparities. There are different types of orders through which you can avoid losses due to too much time between your intentions of selling and the actual execution of the sale.
Bid and Ask Prices
As an educated investor you should be acquainted with the meaning of bid and ask prices and the difference between ask and bid prices, referred to as the spread.
Stock Share Types
Stock investing includes many terms with which every investor should become familiar in order to make educated decisions. Additionally, the different shares, such as authorized, treasury, outstanding and etc. have different characteristics.
Stock Market Indexes and Fair Value Indications
Stock market indexes and their relationship to “fair value” give investors a hint on how the market will open.
Stock Split Basics
There are times when a company may decide to split its stocks. However stock split is not an enough indicator that the company is worth of investing in and further research should be done to see whether it is really reasonable to invest there.
Stock Market Sectors Classification
There are many ways in which stocks can be classified. One of the most preferred ones is by the sector in which the particular business that issues the stocks falls.
Federal Reserve Board (Fed) Functions and Importance
The Fed can be defined as the driver of the markets since it regulates its speeds. So, keep a close eye on the meetings of the Fed and the announcements they make after the meetings, since a view on the interest rate direction can be made.
Stock Market Cycles
Many investors get panicked when they hear that the market has dropped significantly. However, experienced stock investors are well aware that such falls are absolutely normal being part of the stock market cycle.
Stock Dividends Basics
Dividends represent the profits that a company distributes to its owners. Many investors consider stock dividends as a good way to meet their financial goals.
Stock Basics
In order to get a clear view of how the stock market operates you should become familiar with the essence of stocks themselves.
Stock Buyback Reasons
Companies issue stock in order to obtain resources for the financing of particular projects and they have the right to buy them back under specific conditions. This action is known as stock buyback.
Stock Investing Basics
Before you start investing on the stock market you should be well familiar with the general stock market terms and definitions like stocks, types of stocks, class A and class B stocks, investment risk, etc.
Investment Goals Planning
The first step before you embark on any investment activities is the setting of investment goals. You may find it difficult to harmonize your goals since some of them may conflict each other or may not coincide with your way of life.
Classes of Assets - Asset Class Definition
Basically there are three major classes of assets. When constructing your investment portfolio you may select any of them and make combinations out of them.
Mutual Funds vs Individual Stocks
Many investors face the dilemma of whether to select mutual funds or stocks as their investment tool. In order to decide which tactic best fits your needs, you should be well grounded in the pros and cons of each of them.
Stock Investing vs. Saving
Whereas investing represents a proactive activity the opposite is true for saving. Saving incorporates compounding, in which it is similar to investing.