Investment Intelligence
This guide shows you how to use the resources in the Business Library to learn about investing, follow the markets, find out how to reseach stocks, bonds, mutual funds and other investments, find tools for building and monitoring a portfolio of investments, and use additional resources for investment research and ideas.
1) Research the Markets
Competition is keen on the Internet to attract and keep individual investors interested. The result is a wealth of in-depth, free business and market news sites and investing portals, some of which offer premium services. Bloomberg.com gathers and publishes financial and market news from around the world. The Market Data section covers stock indices, bond rates, currencies, mutual funds, ETFs, commodities and economic data for the Americas, Asia and Europe. Bloomberg also provides live business news on Bloomberg Radio. MarketWatch, published by Dow Jones & Company, tracks the daily markets and reports business news, personal finance information, real-time commentary and and provides investment tools and data. BigCharts ia a service of MarketWatch that provides easy access to interactive charts, quotes, stock screeners and other investment tools. CNBC covers stock market, business, and financial news, earnings, world market news and information and offers live feeds from CNBC TV. FT.com is the leading British business newspaper and gives an international perspective on the latest US and international business, finance, economic and political, news, with commentary, analysis and extensive market data. Reuter's Business & Financial covers world markets. MSN Money is a comprehensive source covering business and financial news, investing and personal finance. Yahoo! Finance is an investment portal that features current market news, stock, bond and mutual fund quotes, research and downloadable data. RealClearMarkets syndicates top market-related stories from leading publications. FINRA Market Data is a free data source from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority that has comapny information, equities and options data, bonds, and mutual funds.
2) Investment Education on the Internet
The Investor's Clearinghouse, sponsored by the Alliance for Investor Education, brings together links to high quality investor education materials from leading non-profits, governemntal and self regulatory associations and agencies on all aspects of investing and personal financial planning. Participants include the American Association of Individual Investors and Better Investing. The Investor Protection Trust has partnered with Kiplinger to publish free booklets and videos on the basics of investing. Investopedia, now part of the Forbes Digital Network, is an investment education portal that includes a financial dictionary, artcilcles, tutorials, FAQs, and a free stock market game. FINRA (Financial Industry Regulatory Authority) has a special section devoted to Investors.The Motley Fool aims to amuse while offering informative articles and primers on investing and personal finance. All of the leading mutual fund companies including Fidelity, T. Rowe Price, and Vanguard have extensive investor education and personal finance resources.
3) Stock Research
Stock research resources include stock reporting services, company financials databases, investment research reports, business news and articles, investment portals, tutorials, aned many others. Standard & Poor's NetAdvantage includes all of the S&P Stock Reports covering U.S. and major international companies as well as The Outlook, S&P's advisory newsletter, and recent Compustat financials. You can use the Company Research Tutorial and the Company Information Center to learn about many more sources for researching companies. Most of the market news and investment portals discussed above have stock research and data. Among the best are Bloomberg.com, MarketWatch, Morningstar, MSN Money, Reuters, and Yahoo! Finance. The BLOOMBERG terminal located on the third floor of Library West next to the Reference Desk has professional research and trading tools used by professional equity investors and trading desks around the world. Users may register and become certified by taking online video tutorials and passing exams administered by Bloomberg.
4) Bond Research
The BLOOMBERG terminal located on the third floor of Library West next to the Reference Desk is a professional investment service with comprehensive coverage and analytical tools for bond markets worldwide. Global Financial Data has historical stock, financial and economic time series data including money rates, bond yields and bond indices for countries throughout the world. Standard & Poor's NetAdvantage includes the S&P Bond Guide in addition to its other company information resources. Investing In Bonds is an investor education website sponsored by SIFMA (Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association). It provides a comprehensive introduction to investing in all kinds of bonds including Municipal, Government, Corporate and Mortgage-Backed and Asset-Backed Securities. Besides detailed primers the site has Bond Market data, indices, and quotes for specific issues as well as market news. The Yahoo! Bond Center is a user-friendly financial website that offers bond quotes, market news and commentary, current and historical yields on representative issues of governemnt, corporate and municipal debt. Tools include a bond screener and bond calculators. Yahoo's Learn About Bond Investing covers bond basics. FINRA Market Data covers corporate, municipal, treasury and Agency debt issues.
