Stock Market for the Starters

We all dream of the day when we can be in our house sitting on a sofa sipping nice tea along with an assortment of cookies and in the meantime you know that every minute there is money rolling into your bank account . Talk of good times and if wishes were horses then everybody would ride them. Yes, in theory the above can be true but there are two ways to do that , the first one to start a company, make it profitable, sell a a majority share to somebody else then reap the fruits of your labor through... Read more »

Emotions, Trading Systems, And The Stock Market

Do you remember your first trade? Did you get butterflies in your stomach when you were giving your broker the authority to place the trade, or if you were placing the trade online did you get a buzz when you were about to press the confirm button? If you are like most people than you probably did, and you probably also read the share price every day in the morning paper, or watched the computer screen the entire time the market was open. With each movement of the share price up you probably experienced... Read more »

Types Of Stocks For Investing - Common Stock & Preferred Stock

Once you have decided to invest in the stock market then you start hearing the terms common stock, preferred stock, type A and type B. Well what are they, how much risk they carry and what happens to the stock in terms voting rights.It is these voting rights that determine who has the voice to be heard during the annual general meeting of the board. Let us first discuss common stock, common stock is the common stock of share issued by the company and these common shareholders holding common shares... Read more »

Taxes and the Stock Market

If you are just starting out in the stock market, you may be wondering how you will be affected by taxes. Will you owe money on your gains and how much? What if you lose? And what if you lose on some stocks and have gains on others? Lets use an example and say that you bought and sold your first stock and made a gain. That’s great but you now you will owe taxes! You will have to send the IRS the tax at the end of the quarter and you will have to learn how to do that. It is not like your paycheck... Read more »

From Gold to Dust in South American mining

Last month, citing the need to exercise greater control over national mineral resources, Ecuador suspended exploration and revoked a series of mining concessions. Late this week, Venezuela banned open-pit mining, and halted all activity in the vast Imataca reserve, which includes the town of El Dorado in the remote south-eastern part of the country. Equity and debt prices for internationally listed companies mining in large parts of Latin America have deteriorated sharply in recent weeks. What does... Read more »

Stock Market Limit Orders Explained

Investing in stocks and trading stocks is very easy now that it can all be done online without ever picking up the phone. But to do it right, you need to be aware of some of the different options you have. When you log into your online account to buy or sell a stock, you will be presented with a choice of what type of order you want to place. The standard options are “market”, “limit”, “stop”, and “stop limit”. Most of the time you will probably pick... Read more »

What are Bull Markets and Bear Markets?

If you are new to stock market investing, two terms you will hear thrown around a lot are “bull market’ and “bear market”. What do these terms mean and what does investing have to do with bulls and bears? A bull market is when most people feel positive about the stock market and want to buy stocks. It is during long bull markets that the stock market keeps going up and up. A bear market is the opposite and is when the stock market keeps going down no matter what. It is during... Read more »

Is a Financial Market Last Straw Event on the Way?

I can’t help but think that a final straw event that dramatically breaks the backs of world financial markets is on the way. Once that straw arrives there will be little that Ben Bernanke and the Fed can do about it. Extreme unwarranted optimism will turn to black hole pessimism overnight. So far the stock market has performed extremely well after the massive injections of liquidity engineered by Ben and his good buddy at the US Treasury, Hank Paulson. It’s amazing what billions of Dollars... Read more »

Online Stock Trading - Is It Right For You?…

Online trading has exploded in popularity as telephone charges and broker fees have collapsed and internet bandwidth has soared. Combine this with the recent trend away from corporate environments in favor of working from home, and you can see how online trading has become both a viable business and an ideal lifestyle. Online stock trading (or even stock futures trading) follows the same principles as traditional trading as far as the fundamentals are concerned. You are still buying or trading the... Read more »

Online Trading; Why I Hate Economists!

In mid-July 2007, the Dow Jones index stock market made what appeared to be an important top. Naturally, this gave rise among the usual TV pundits to pessimistic perceptions of the US economy, the long-term impact of the war in Iraq, and so on. However, what is fascinating and even mildly annoying is that just a week prior, when the Dow Jones broke to new all-time highs on July 12th, the analysis could not have been more euphoric. At least one economic commentator could see the Dow many thousands... Read more »