stock market?

Question

Hi, Im a teenager and my dad just told me to buy some stocks cuz they are going to 'help' me later or whatever. So i need help. I dont even know what Stock Markets are (well i do but not really) and i dont even know how to and where to buy them, and i just need help on buying some stocks. Some general idea and help would be appreciated!

Answer 1

ok, I could never have enough room here to tell you everything you need to know so I'm going to tell you where to go instead...

yahoo.finance.com - read this everyday and try to keep up with stock prices and movements as well as news and how the news affects the stock price - after a few weeks of doing this you'll start to see where you want to put money

watch CNBC on TV - it's basic cable and you'll know it because it's that channel that you always skip over because you don't understand what the hell all those numbers on there mean and what they're talking about at all...

all you need to start before you go on and start looking at yahoo.finance is that the stock market is the name for when buyers and sellers of stocks are matched up - it can get a little technical and you don't need to worry about exactly how it works BUT you do need to know that stock prices will vary day after day and when you begin following their movements on the price charts like I told you, then you will begin to understand everything you really need to know...

Answer 2

Forget stocks. You don't have enough to invest in a diversified portfolio. There are two risks in the stock market. The first is market risk. The market will go up or down and you can't do anything about it. The second risk is company risk. If you buy one stock, you live and die by what that company does. In order to eliminate company risk you need to diversify your stock portfolio. In order to do this you need to invest in fifty to one hundred different companies in different industries.
When starting out and until you have enough to diversify a portfolio you should be looking at mutual funds. You can buy a fund that is diversified, a fund will hold stocks in many companies. You should also look at a fund that is well managed and has low costs. Vanguard has many funds that are inexpensive. There are other fund families that don't charge a high fee to invest.
Fees to invest in a mutual fund range from load fees, a fee to get in or out of a fund. These fees can be as high 5.75% of the amount you invest.
The second fee a fund can charge is a 12B1 fee. This is an annual sales charge and it can be as high as 3% of the value of your investment each year.
All funds have expense fees. These are fund manager fees and can be as high as 3% of the value of your investment each year.
I mentioned Vanguard because you buy direct from them so there is no load fee and no 12B1 fee, ever. The expense fee they charge is the lowest in the mutual fund industry. They averge .75% of 1%, depending upon the fund.
Start with a fund, accumulate wealth and study investing so that you can make good, informed decisions. Good Luck!

Answer 3

I think the answer above about mutual funds is good advice.
As far as individual stocks goes,everybody will tell you to read Benjamin Gram
.Don't.
Start with "How I made 2 million dollars" by nick Darvis.
Read books by John Murphy too.
I think the best thing to do is figure out your own investing ideas.
Diversify for sure.(stocks fall from the sky sometimes)

Answer 4

Hello...and although I'm not an expert on which stocks to buy...I have done rather well in the past. I recently purchased some Logitech (LOGI) on Scottrade (email [e-mail] for 3 free trades from me refering you) and it has went up $3 a share! I wouldn't recomend buying this now but its up to you..I'm guessing it will keep going up. The next I plan on investing in is something to do with those new blue-ray dvds coming out. How much do you get to invest with?

Answer 5

Your question reveals the fact that you are a complete newbie with completely no basic, fundamental knowledge in the stock markets and is about to do something you might regret for a very long time.

Frankly, if you are asking people for favourite stocks, then I think it is time you take a step back and improve on your financial literacy and investment education before you attempt to invest in anything. Listening to free, off the street advice is an expressway to disaster. Read more good books and articles on investments to expand your vision and horizon before you decide to go deeper into the subject. For some of the best investment books that I have ever read, please visit http://www.bestoptiontradingbooks.com

Investing or trading the stock markets never start from asking how to buy a certain stock ... it starts from adequate investment and trading knowledge. There are quite a number of things you need to learn before you can even start thinking of the stock markets ...

1. You need to understand how the stock market works and what it is exactly about.

2. You need to know what are the different styles of trading in stocks and shares.

3. You need to read about why so many people lose their shirts in the stock markets so that you can avoid their mistakes and also decide if this is a risk you want to take.

For all these issues and more, you can read about them from some of the articles that I wrote at http://www.mastersoequity.com/articles.htm

After you are adequately armed with the basic concepts and ideas, you need to know how to find profitable stocks to trade or invest in. You can do that the easy way by subscribing to stock pick services (example http://www.stockpickmaster.com ) or you can learn to use charting tools and softwares to find stocks with parameters that you can pre-define. (example http://www.worden.com )

All in all, investment and trading is a lifelong education and non stop learning. No one is ever done learning and catching up with changes in the markets.

If you care to read about how I went from completely broke to retired millionaire trading stocks and options by 28 years old, you can go to http://www.mastersoequity.com/

Remember, the slogan "Just Do It", Just won't do for the stock markets. If profiting in the stock markets is as simple as buying a single stock , then why are so many people still poor?

After you have all the above mentioned knowledge, you need to ask the following golden questions before you can decide whether a stock is worth buying or not :

1. Why are you of the opinion that this stock will rise?

2. Is your opinion valid in the first place?

3. When are you expecting it to rise? Can you hold on for that period of time or longer?

4. What is your expected entry price? After what price would your expected profit margin be too thin to enter upon?

5. Where is your expected stop loss point? What is your stop loss point based on? Where will you tell yourself that it is time to take a loss and get out?

6. Where is your expected profit taking point? What is your profit taking point based on?

7. Does the way you are buying the stock allow you to hold on until your expected profit taking point?

8. How much of your money should you dedicate to this one trade?

9. What is the level of primary, secondary and idiosyncratic risk you are undertaking when deciding how much of your fund to use?

10. What is your cashflow need? Does your cashflow needs allow you to hold the full lifetime of the stock?

After you are able to answer all these questions confidently, THEN you are ready to... PAPER TRADE your stock strategy. Yes, even at this point, you are NOT READY to trade for real. You should trade on PAPER for at least 6 months and become consistently successful BEFORE you take your stock strategy into real life.

Then.. you are ready to start... but there is still no guarantee of success as paper trading is very different from real trading. You will need another maybe 1 year or 2 trading very little money and be consistently successful BEFORE you are ready to increase your stakes.


So, as you can see, success in the stock markets is not easy at all the the less knowledge you have, the more risk you undertake. I lost hundreds of thousands in the stock markets before I become successful.

Take heed and good luck.




http://www.mastersoequity.com



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Answer 6

Try a mutual fund such as Franklins Founders Fund. FFALX
They are a group of stocks and other equity devices run by an expert.

Answer 7

Hi, i suggest a great site with plenty of Issues related to your Investing and everything around it. it also provide clear and accurate answer to many common questions.

I am sure that you can get your answers in this website.

http://investing.sitesled.com/

Good Luck and Best Wishes!

Answer 8

You may benefit from this link on investing for beginners:
http://www.best-stock-trading-systems.com/stock_market_for_dummies.html