Business Basics for Engineers
Public Company Investment Snapshots: Library Subscription
Prudent investors do not simply rely upon financial analysts recommendations to buy, hold or sell an investment. Besides looking at above concise reports on company performance, investors should keep the cautions detailed by the SEC about analysist reports in mind. Analyzing Analyst Recommendations
Market Insight (Standard & Poor's) The original company tear sheet (concise company report for investors now delivered via pdf.) The last page of each S&P Stock Report includes a glossary.
Mergent Online Better known for their indepth company details and financials (going back 15 years). Tear sheets are also provided and the advanced search acts as a stock screener. Only public companies and exchange traded funds (ETF) but not mutual funds included.
Morningstar Best known for mutual fund ratings, Morningstar also provides analysis of public companies with analyst recommendations. The Portfolio X-Ray utility allows the user to build a portolio and analyse it. Includes a screener to identify stocks and funds by performance, industry or style criteria.
ValueLine Learn how to read a ValueLine tear sheet, and understand their ranking sytem check out this guide For indepth and multimedia explanations for using ValueLine and building a portfolio, explore the Education tab
Public Company Investment Snapshots: Free Authoritative
Mutual Funds
SEC 10K's and Conference Calls
Securities and Exchange Commission annual reports called 10K's and conference calls made by the public relations departments of traded companies to explain and put their spin past on performance are two of the underlying sources financial analysts use to write their reports and arrive at recommendtions. The investor relations section of most public company web sites provide access to SEC filings and conference calls. In addition use the following sites:
Company News
Track news and developments about your picks in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Financial Times or online news via Google News.
Wall Street Journal The web site only provides teasers. For full text use ABI/Inform
New York Times Also available in full text electronically via Lexis/Nexis
Financial Times Also available in full text via Lexis/Nexis or ABI/Inform
Personal Investing Guides
Use the library catalog to find "how to" investing guides. Search for subject terms "investments" "stocks" "bonds". Unfortunately there is not a sure fire way of limiting results to books written for the personal investor, rather than the professional trader or academic. The following are just a few ebooks in our collection.
Beginners Guide to Mutual Funds
Mutual Fund Prospectus Tips for Reading One
Mutual Fund Rules: 50 Essential Axioms to Explain and Examine Mutual Fund Investing
Bear Market Investing Strategies
Bond Market Rules: 50 Investing Axioms to Master Bonds for Income or Trading
Personal Finance: Keeping Current
These newsletters and magazines are written for the personal investor and not professonal investment advisors. Get in the habit of reading them, and you'll know all about current developments and trends.
Terminology
Every industry has it's own jargon, especially the financial services industry. When you don't know what it means, look it up!
