STOCK MARKET FOR DUMMIES: NOT WITH WALLSTREET SURVIVOR!
You’ve got to love things that are FREE and especially when they are as good as Wall Street Survivor. If you are looking for a fun way to learn about the stock market and find out what it will be like to actually make stock trades online, you will find this stock market simulation game to exactly what you are looking for.
The Wall Street Survivor website is a comprehensive stock market simulation game and learning center where you can get your feet wet in buying and selling stocks that comes complete with $20,000 in monthly prizes that anyone can win just for participating.
After you go through the quick FREE sign up process, your account will be credited with $100,000 in virtual dollars that will be your portfolio to do with as you wish. Just like on any real online stock broker site, you can then use that money to invest in any stock you can find on the real market.
You will be buying and selling stock in no time on Wall Street Survivor and any type of trade you can do in the real wold you can do here. That means you can short stocks and then cover them and you can even set up a second portfolio (with virtual money of course) just to trade options. My portfolio looks like this at the time of this post so I actually have a gain after several months of trading:
Anyone who wants to get their feet wet trading stocks without risking their own money will love this stock market simulation game and there is such a wealth of information there as well. Stock quotes, stock tips, up to date stock analysis, forums, contests, tutorials, and business news are just some of the things that are all there for you to use. Some of the features cost money (such as real time stock quotes) but you can learn so much for free that it will keep you occupied for months.
Wall Street Survivor is the place where any beginner can have fun and learn about stocks at the same time, all for FREE. If you want to try out your stock picking skills and see what would happen with your picks had you bought them for real, this is the place to do it. Your portfolio will look just like it would if you were trading for real and you can watch it go up and down daily. The more involved you are the more chances you have to win and you can even earn free gift cards for trading in the activity points you get just for being active. Give it a try!
STOCK INVESTING FOR DUMMIES
Are you a new investor who is interested in stocks? Everyone at one time or another becomes at least a little bit curious about the stock market but few people ever really get involved. At least not directly by buying and selling stocks on their own.
If you are interested in finding out what it would be like to have a portfolio and do your own stock investing, you might want to sign up for the free stock simulation game called WallStreet Survivor. Not only can you use it to learn how to trade (with virtual money), but there are also a lot of tools and resources that will aid you in gaining a greater understanding of how to get started trading stocks.
Stock investing is something you should only do with money that you can afford to lose. There is risk in stocks no matter how safe your choice(s) seem to be. If you invest money that you know you need or will need, that is truly stock investing for dummies and you should not complain if you lose money. Not all investing is risk free and betting on stocks is one of those that carries various amounts of risk.
Too many people had all the money in their 401K plans invested in stocks and that is why so many Baby Boomers are having trouble retiring right now. You see, that was retirement money they need right now or very shortly from now and the market downturn took a lot of it away. That is why it is smart to invest less and less in stocks the older you get. Had they switched their 401K investments from stock mutual funds into something safer, they would have lost less and been much better off than they are now.
Learning how to buy and sell stocks is actually quite easy. Most people do it all online now by signing up to one of the many stock broker sites. Anyone who has any familiarity with the Internet and computers can learn to trade and manage their account. It is the actual stock picking and figuring out what to invest in that is the hard part.
Picking the right stocks and knowing when to sell them is something that people struggle with every day. It is sort of like predicting the future and no one has a 100% success rate. Even if you somehow had insider information it wouldn’t guarantee you that you would make money. You see, there are a lot of factors that go into determining a stock’s price and the one that plays the biggest role is that of perception. Stocks are bought and sold everyday and their price is based purely on what people are willing to pay for them.
The free market as well as supply and demand determine stock prices. Of course, a lot of that demand (or lack of it) is based on how well a company is doing. For instance, if a company is having troubles like Toyota is right now, people know what is happening are are less inclined to buy the stock. Less demand means a dropping share price. Conversely, if a company is on fire and releasing products that everyone loves, it is perceived that they will be making money and people will bid up the price of the stock due to high demand.
People use a variety of methods to choose their stocks. A lot of stock picks are in financial magazines and newsletters that can be subscribed to. There are radio talk shows that discuss stock picks as well as a good number of investing shows on television where you can get all sorts of information. Those are the places that most people probably get information on stocks and where they base their decisions off of. A lesser number of people actually know enough to do their own stock analysis and find stocks they are interested in on their own.
A good number of people don’t invest in individual stocks but instead put their money in something known as funds. Mutual funds are investment vehicles that are comprised of a group of stocks and they are managed by a professional. There are fees associated with putting your money in a fund but it is often thought that a professional stock fund manager has a better chance of making money for you than you do yourself. You can put your money in thousands of different funds that each have their own investment objectives and you can choose a fund based on what types of stocks you would like to put money into.
Stock investing has always been thought to give a person the highest return over a long period of time. Because of the risk involved, buying stocks for short term investments is never recommended in case the market goes down. If you have money that is only available for a short time, it should be put in bonds, CD’s, treasury bills, or some other safer investment that is guaranteed through FDIC insurance.
However, if you have money that you don’t need for 5 or more years (and that number is arbitrary), any long term investment plan that involves stocks should be able to overcome periodic market dips and will most likely provide a nice return many years later. The more years you have to invest your money, the safer you should be in the stock market because you have time to make up the losses during the down periods and the up periods can be quite profitable.