Question: Where do I find information on how to invest some money I have been saving?
Answer: The library has access to books, magazines and databases to help you get started with investing.
Getting Started
Begin by looking at some general books on investing – these will
give you information on the overall investment process and on companies
and industries in which you might invest your money depending on your needs.
Things to consider – Do you want short term or long-term results? Are
you willing to invest your money and leave it for the long run or will
it be something you may need to get into in an emergency? Some good books
for getting started are Everyone’s
Money Book on Stocks, Bonds and Mutual Funds,The
Small Investor and The
Everything Investing Book.
More books on investing and several decent Web sites good for research are available in theYoung Investors Pathfinder.
Before you invest thoroughly research a company to learn its good and bad qualities: study its trends and history to determine if it has strong leadership; does it make or lose money every year; what products does it sell or manufacture; does it operate locally, nationally or internationally? Does a company interest you because you like to buy the products? Consider companies whose products you like to buy – think Nike, Kristy Kreme and Starbucks. Some good company research sources include Standard & Poor’s Stock Reports, Standard & Poor’s Standard Corporation Descriptions, and the International Directory of Company Histories.
Investigate industry and market information to learn the trends of an industry. Is it a prosperous industry or is it something people were interested in 10 years ago? Are people buying things made in this industry or was it just a passing fancy? Coffee shops like Starbucks were once considered a fad – but now there’s one on practically every corner! For industry research use Mergent's Industry Review, Standard & Poor’s Industry Surveys and the Market Share Reporter.
Current information is vital in investment research; you’ll need it to help you make informed decisions. If you gather old data you could lose a lot of money. Newspapers are a good source for current information about companies and stocks. The Wall Street Journal is a standard and TCCL has an online subscription that’s available outside our libraries, making it an easy newspaper to peruse. Try Investor’s Business Daily too – IBD presents the important news of the day in a reader-friendly format. If you’re investing local companies don’t forget to search the Tulsa World and The (Daily) Oklahoman – both of which you can search online from any of our libraries.
Magazines are another terrific source for current information – Business Week, Forbes, Fortune, Money and Kiplinger’s Personal Finance are all solid publications that are available in print at a number of libraries throughout the system and online via the library’s subscription service Business Source Elite.
Consider reading one or some of the myriad of investment newsletters subscribed to by the library. For stock research try Analyst Watch, Bowser Report, Chartist, Dick Davis Digest or Standard & Poor’s Outlook. If you’re investigating mutual funds read the Growth Fund Guide and Moneyletter.
General investment newsletters to which the library subscribes include Dines Letter and No-Load Fund Investor. Standard & Poor’s CreditWeek focuses on ratings, trends and an outlook for fixed income securities and Security Owner’s Stock Guide is a monthly summary of Standard & Poor’s ratings, price range, earnings, dividends and capitalization for about 5,300 common and preferred stocks. Standard & Poor’s Statistical Service has excellent coverage of current and basic statistics arranged in a variety of areas including banking & finance, production indexes and labor statistics, security price index record and more.
The library subscribes to a lot of databases you can use to research investment possibilities. Again, for magazine articles to research a company or to study trends use Business Source Elite.
Mergent Online, available only at Hardesty Regional and the Central Library, contains Securities & Exchange Commission filings and current and archival annual reports on more than 11,000 U.S. public companies, historical records on defunct public companies and real time news from several wire services. This is a good source for information on the financial stability of a company.
For solid, no-nonsense news, get in the habit of reading Kiplinger Business Forecasts. This full-text database provides concise, authoritative business forecasts for the U.S. and abroad; it’s also available to library customers at home.
If you’re investigating companies more well-known on a regional level try NewsBank NewsFile which is available at all of our libraries. Through NewsBank you can access full-text articles from newspapers across the country. At least one major newspaper, and usually more, is available from every state. Newspaper Source, also available from all libraries and at home, is another good tool for information on a regional level.
Now you know the tools you can use to get you started – good luck with the research and may your investments wield a high return!
If you have any questions, contact your local library or ask a librarian!