Basic things you need to begin investing in stocks
April 17, 2006 – 6:59 amIf you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
One of the most common questions asked in stock market forums appears to be: “how can I get started investing in stocks?”. It’s not hard to get set up, but you still need to know what you’re doing in order to have much chance of success. Here are the absolute basics you need to begin investing:
1) A brokerage account: this is where you will actually make trades. The basic idea behind brokerage accounts are that they will trade your stocks for you, and charge you a commission on trades. The lower the charge per trade, the more likely you are to make profit. For this reason, discount brokerages are all the rage. Here are some reliable discount on-line brokerages:
All of them offer decent service, at affordable prices and have been used by many investors for years. 2) Basic knowledge of trading. The brokerage account is all you need to begin trading, but it’s like sending an unarmed man into battle. If you don’t research your purchases, you’ll end up losing money and becoming frustrated with your investments, like so many others do. Research is king, because it allows you to purchase a stock with some amount of confidence. If you try to “follow the crowd”, you’ll end up following the crowd off a cliff.
Don’t concern yourself with what other people are doing. Unless they show you their tax returns, you have no idea of the veracity of their claims. Look for small gains, and invest heavily in quality companies, that offer products which are changing people’s lives. We’ll take a look at more of what you can do in our beginner’s series of posts.
If you enjoyed this post, subscribe to the Superior Investor Blog RSS feed!.
