Investment Guide

Most people are trying to find ways on how to generate extra earnings aside from their regular sources of revenues. Trading in the stock market is a lucrative opportunity that investors can look into for that additional income. Investing in stocks offers a higher rate of return when compared to savings account and other similar bank products. The downside, however, when playing the stock market is the higher risk involved. This can be attributed to the fact that one can never correctly project how the stock prices will behave and what factors would affect their performances. Many players in the stock market have been badly burned due to their bad judgments in placing their money on the non-performing stocks.

Stock market analysts have two ways of predicting the behavior of stock prices. Although these indicators are not foolproof and guaranteed to make you very rich, these should be carefully looked into before getting into any hasty investments. A stock represents a particular listed company. Its price will reflect whatever it is the firm stands for. Its activity is greatly influenced by the interests shown by the different buyers and sellers. How a stock is perceived by the investors plays an important role as to its worth and value. Hence, there are two aspects that you should consider – the fundamental analysis and the technical analysis. Read the rest of this entry »

In the past few years, more and more people have been putting mutual funds into consideration when thinking of where to invest their hard-earned money and how to effectively handle their finances. What are mutual funds and why are the numbers jumping onto the mutual fund bandwagon increasing?

A mutual fund is also called an “open-ended company” and is one of the three basic types of investment companies. A mutual fund is a type of investment where a company raises money by directly selling shares of the mutual fund to several shareholders and/or investors. The price of a share is the mutual fund’s per share Net Asset Value (NAV) and this fluctuates and is calculated on a daily basis. The investment company then uses the collected money to purchase various types and combinations of assets and securities such as stocks, bonds, and other money market tools. Shareholders of the mutual fund make money by having the income from the different investments divided among them according to the value of their shares. All of the assets of the mutual fund are collectively called its portfolio and is handled by a fund manager or a portfolio manager. Shareholders in the mutual fund are free to give up their shares and may sell them at any time they deem it proper to do so. Read the rest of this entry »