Edition Three

More Investing Information • Coffee Talk: Edition 1 • How to Become Wealthy • Investing 101

Related Resources • Coffee Talk 1 • Coffee Talk 2 • Coffee Talk 3 • Coffee Talk 4

What's the difference between an Annuity and a Mutual Fund?

Answer

Question: How do I research a company?

It's not a dumb question at all.  If you know the name of the company you want to invest in, you go to a site that offers quotes [there are millions; the easiest is perhaps Yahoo! Finance... http://finance.yahoo.com/ ]  You need to find the company's TICKER SYMBOL.  If you don't know it already.   Click on "Find Symbol" to the right of text box, and type in the name of the company.  It should bring up the ticker symbol of the company [for example, Coke's symbol is KO, Microsoft, MSFT, Dell Computers, DELL, AT&T is T, etc...]   Once you have it, go back and type it in the "GET QUOTES" box, and it will bring up information about the company... everything from stock price to insider trading information, etc...

If you want to find out how the actual market as a whole is doing, go to the Market Information subject on the http://beginnersinvest.about.com page.  There you can link to the CNBC's, and CNNFN sites that will give you a quote of the market price.  The Dow Jones history can be found at: http://www.dowjones.com/corp/index_average.html And the stocks that make up the average can be found": http://www.dowjones.com/corp/index_average.html

In the future, if you want information on the Nasdaq, etc., just go to their web site.   They are generally the best source of information on the market or index.

Hope this was helpful. 

Joshua Kennon

Question: Where can I find information on Income and Foreign Stocks?

I have an interest in in income stock and foreign investments. Could you give me suggestions as to the most stable investments in both areas?

Thank you,
C. Pierce

Answer

Income stocks are those which have a large dividend yield.   For instance, many bank and tobacco company stocks will have 5, 6, or 7% yields because they pay out such a high portion of their earnings to shareholders.  Definitely start in those sectors.  Many finance websites like Yahoo! Finance will allow you to use a "stock screener" which will find stocks that pay out certain amounts [for instance, you could screen for a Bank Stock that pays a 6% dividend] and it would bring up the best matches to your search.  Some telecoms pay out decent dividends, as well as most blue chip companies.  Then again, you could also purchase preferred stock, which is a mixture between a stock and a bond.  They generally have much higher yields and pay out large dividends but have very little movement in the stock price itself.  The stock screener would be the most helpful, just make sure that you find out if the company has a LONG history of paying out dividends and it wasn't a fluke thing that they did once.

Foreign stocks are a tricky matter, because you get into currency rate issues.  For instance, you may double your money in Japan, but if the yen
all of a sudden becomes weak against the dollar, when you convert it back to dollars, you will lose what you have made. You could buy ADR shares
[American Depository Receipts] which act as United States stocks, but are really just a mirror of the parent stock on the foreign market.  An example would be Sony .  You may ask your broker about foreign index funds or a Global Mutual Fund from someone like Fidelity or Merrill Lynch.  That could be incredibly helpful, as some of the mutual fund companies have excellent global investing funds.

Good Luck!

Joshua Kennon
http://beginnersinvest.about.com