Smart – and wealthy - investors know that the profitable, practical and intelligent way to invest is through the time honored approach of value investing as practiced by super investors like Warren Buffett, Bill Nygren, Walter Schloss, Peter Lynch, Charlie Munger and many of the other gurus as covered by Gurufocus.com.
This means that investors need to learn about the company, its products and services, management, competitors, competitive position in its industry and financial statements. All this is easily accessible via the internet on various websites and online databases that your local public library has – FOR FREE! Click on this link to find out where your local public library is located: Public Libraries
In this, the first part of a multi-part, article, I will introduce some of the various methods that a modern day (computer savvy) individual investor can conduct research. Research that will enable the investor to find companies similar to the ones that the super investors as mentioned above might find and research. All you need is a computer, access to the internet and some time and paper. Let me explain.
Many public libraries give their patrons access to public computers for free. From there it is just literally a few clicks of a mouse to get on to the internet. And once you get onto the internet, a whole new world of business information is available to the individual investor.
Generally the individual investors’ first stop should be to one of the more mainstream financial websites like Yahoo! Finance, MSN Money, Reuters, MarketWatch. These four websites can be generally thought of as ‘financial supermarket’ in which they fast access to company news and events, company financial statements, access to bulletin boards for subscribers, historical stock prices, charts and financial statistics. In addition, MSN Money, Yahoo! Finance and MarketWatch offer stock screeners. Reuters has recently revamped the site and didn’t include a stock screener on the site.
All the sites are intuitive and easy to use and can be fairly easily searched using the ‘search’ icon on each sites’ homepage. So, now that you, the individual investor has the current ‘poop’ on XYZ Corp. and you want to delve deeper into the companies products, services, history or management, what do you do?
Well, many public libraries have access to what are euphemistically known in library circles as ‘online databases’. To the layperson these are just internet sites, but lo, they offer much more information than what Yahoo! Finance, MSN Money, Reuters or MarketWatch offer…these databases are searchable and offer full-text (in most instances) of articles that aren’t available to users of the previously mentioned financial supermarket websites.
For example, there is an online database at public libraries called ‘Business and Company Resource Center’ (also known as BCRC). A company called Cengage (formerly Gale) owns this database and offers it many libraries. Individual investors can access this database remotely – that is, at home – or in the library.
Users can search the database for articles pertaining to a subject they are interested in, or, more commonly, search for a company by name. Searching by name gives you a list of companies similar to the sought after name, but lists sales and a link to more information about the company.
Following a few more clicks and the user will be faced with subjects about the company they searched for. In particular, BCRC links to articles on topics as varies as Financial Data, Legal Issues, Management, Operations & Technology, People, Products & Services, Sales & Marketing, Statistics and Strategy & Planning. From here it is just one click to a list of these articles on the topic of your choosing. The careful reader will recognize that the topics listed are exactly the same ideas that the careful and considerate value investor would look for when evaluating whether a company is undervalued, fairly valued, or overvalued.
In many cases, the user can find full-text articles. That is, the user can find the actual text of the article online. Full-text articles can be either emailed or you can download and save it to your computer or you can print it directly.
Virtually any topic related to business, finance and investing can be searched for – and, in many cases, some articles will appear.
Of note, users should recognize be aware of when the article was published. In some cases, a current article is more relevant than an older article. In other cases, the user might be looking for historical information. Take time to figure out how old the article is in either case.
Also, users should know the authority of the writer. That is, is the article being published by the Journal of Portfolio Management or is it being published by Fortune or by Inc.? This information matters to the discriminating investor who wants to practice the value investing techniques of Buffett, Lynch, Nygren, Munger and others.
In the next article, I will discuss another aspect of researching a company via the online databases available to individual investors at their public library.
Links to Websites Discussed in This Article
http://www.marketwatch.com
http://www.reuters.com/finance
http://moneycentral.msn.com/home.asp
http://finance.yahoo.com/
http://www.publiclibraries.com/
This means that investors need to learn about the company, its products and services, management, competitors, competitive position in its industry and financial statements. All this is easily accessible via the internet on various websites and online databases that your local public library has – FOR FREE! Click on this link to find out where your local public library is located: Public Libraries
In this, the first part of a multi-part, article, I will introduce some of the various methods that a modern day (computer savvy) individual investor can conduct research. Research that will enable the investor to find companies similar to the ones that the super investors as mentioned above might find and research. All you need is a computer, access to the internet and some time and paper. Let me explain.
Many public libraries give their patrons access to public computers for free. From there it is just literally a few clicks of a mouse to get on to the internet. And once you get onto the internet, a whole new world of business information is available to the individual investor.
Generally the individual investors’ first stop should be to one of the more mainstream financial websites like Yahoo! Finance, MSN Money, Reuters, MarketWatch. These four websites can be generally thought of as ‘financial supermarket’ in which they fast access to company news and events, company financial statements, access to bulletin boards for subscribers, historical stock prices, charts and financial statistics. In addition, MSN Money, Yahoo! Finance and MarketWatch offer stock screeners. Reuters has recently revamped the site and didn’t include a stock screener on the site.
All the sites are intuitive and easy to use and can be fairly easily searched using the ‘search’ icon on each sites’ homepage. So, now that you, the individual investor has the current ‘poop’ on XYZ Corp. and you want to delve deeper into the companies products, services, history or management, what do you do?
Well, many public libraries have access to what are euphemistically known in library circles as ‘online databases’. To the layperson these are just internet sites, but lo, they offer much more information than what Yahoo! Finance, MSN Money, Reuters or MarketWatch offer…these databases are searchable and offer full-text (in most instances) of articles that aren’t available to users of the previously mentioned financial supermarket websites.
For example, there is an online database at public libraries called ‘Business and Company Resource Center’ (also known as BCRC). A company called Cengage (formerly Gale) owns this database and offers it many libraries. Individual investors can access this database remotely – that is, at home – or in the library.
Users can search the database for articles pertaining to a subject they are interested in, or, more commonly, search for a company by name. Searching by name gives you a list of companies similar to the sought after name, but lists sales and a link to more information about the company.
Following a few more clicks and the user will be faced with subjects about the company they searched for. In particular, BCRC links to articles on topics as varies as Financial Data, Legal Issues, Management, Operations & Technology, People, Products & Services, Sales & Marketing, Statistics and Strategy & Planning. From here it is just one click to a list of these articles on the topic of your choosing. The careful reader will recognize that the topics listed are exactly the same ideas that the careful and considerate value investor would look for when evaluating whether a company is undervalued, fairly valued, or overvalued.
In many cases, the user can find full-text articles. That is, the user can find the actual text of the article online. Full-text articles can be either emailed or you can download and save it to your computer or you can print it directly.
Virtually any topic related to business, finance and investing can be searched for – and, in many cases, some articles will appear.
Of note, users should recognize be aware of when the article was published. In some cases, a current article is more relevant than an older article. In other cases, the user might be looking for historical information. Take time to figure out how old the article is in either case.
Also, users should know the authority of the writer. That is, is the article being published by the Journal of Portfolio Management or is it being published by Fortune or by Inc.? This information matters to the discriminating investor who wants to practice the value investing techniques of Buffett, Lynch, Nygren, Munger and others.
In the next article, I will discuss another aspect of researching a company via the online databases available to individual investors at their public library.
Links to Websites Discussed in This Article
http://www.marketwatch.com
http://www.reuters.com/finance
http://moneycentral.msn.com/home.asp
http://finance.yahoo.com/
http://www.publiclibraries.com/
