Beginners Advice - Finance & Investments

I'll try to keep this short and sweet. I'm a student that has recently switched over from Medicine to a Business finance degree with some other concentrations I managed to work out by taking certain courses.

I've yet to take a course on anything business related so I'm kind of out of the blue with things. I'm wanting to get into the stock/market world and know I'll learn that along the way to getting my degree.

Here's my question: Where did you guys start out learning about such things? What places should I check out? Did you just learn from others/courses?

I've been reading Investopedia some and have learned some cool concepts.

Thanks for the help, this could also maybe help others that are in the same boat as me.

 

http://investopedia.com/ is gold man

This site will even become a study tool for you later in school.


P.S. have fun with accounting



edit: Didn't read the rest of your thread because i was so excited to rep http://investopedia.com/

 

Lol. "Have fun with accounting." True I took intermediate this semester. Tough class but easy enough if you're interested. Dropped the major and went back to CS and another for my dual though, still in the business school.

OP:

I would hold off on becoming overly interested in stock investing. Don't let it be the driving force of your business mindset. It was for me, and it quickly changed when I began to learn more. Perhaps you should join a game on marketwatch.com and play around with virtual currency. It's better than taking your cash to the market with no experience because there is a shit ton you need to know. I put $75 on Robinhood and bought some shares just to see what the process was like, but now I'm down $18 thanks to Western Digital and GoPro.

A book like investing or dummies (if it exists, I'm sure it does) is probably good for getting some lingo down. You'll want to know different kind of investments, what certain terms or acronyms mean, and then really just rely on your classes to learn a lot before you dive in. Does your school have some sort of investment club? Join that, it will be filled with like-minded individuals as yourself.

Investing in stocks is a risky business and really to make money with it, you need to have already had a fair amount. Take Donald Trump for example, he inherited a boat load and is now rich as hell. Granted he was making money from other things as well. Most adults invest in mutual funds because they are safer (less volatile, more diverse). I can't go into much detail because I'm no expert, but what I can say is make sure you don't get ahead of yourself. There is a lot of small detail that it would be foolish to read over.

 

Bump!

 

Join clubs bro

 

Definitely going to be joining clubs on campus. Gonna get fully immersed into the business world.

Or do you mean clubs outside of university?

 

University clubs I mean haha. Where you goin' to school?

 

Understandable! I let you know where on Skype

 

I'm not incredibly knowledgeable but what I know has been learned from reading finance books, forums such as bogleheads, articles online, etc. Actually buying stocks, etf's, index funds, bonds, etc with a small amount of money can be a good way to learn as well through experience.

If you're just wanting to get your foot in the door you'll get a lot of inspirational value reading books like Rich Dad Poor Dad. Another good book I read recently that helped to get some essential information about investing was Tony Robbins' new book but I forget what it's called...

 

^ http://www.amazon.com/MONEY-Master-Game-Financial-Freedom/dp/1476757801

 

I second Rich Dad Poor Dad!

Read as many business/finance books as you can that focus on the core concepts.

 

The Goal was a good ass read too

 

There are many ways you can go about this, but since business and finance is such an immense area, you just have to immerse yourself in it, and the longer you do, the more familiar you will be with the concepts, term, and phenomenon in the area.

For basics though, you'd want to get a solid ground in Economics. This is a good beginners book: http://www.amazon.com/Economics-One-Lesson-Shortest-Understand/dp/0517548232 Temper that with what you're taught in uni/high school, and see where you stand.

You'll also want a good understanding of accounting, specifically, what entities do to generate the financials that they release, and what those financials can mean. This not only means understanding what debits and credits are, but also how inventive accounting can be used to masquerade the companies true financial position.

Then finally, though perhaps slightly more intermediate, you may want to consider some history. See how businesses have truly risen and fallen across the time line, and the events that contributed to that. The recent movie/book The Big Short is an example. Another example, a book that I've recently read is The Prize. That book will not only give you a very detailed account of the history of oil from Rockefellers time till the present, it shows a variety of factors that contributed to the rise and fall of many businesses.


Once you've got those basics down, you should really be able to understand everything you come across quite quickly. Being able to understand what I have just said would give you a solid grounding in how to 'do' fundamental analysis on any given stock or business. Try the Intelligent Investor as well on that area. Don't jump into the stockmarket without understanding what you're doing, you may as well be gambling if you do that.

Get the foundation first, and then take positions on the market. You only learn how to trade by actually trading yourself, but if you trade without any knowledge, you may as well go to the casino as its more entertaining.

Economics
Accounting
Bit of history.
Once you're confident, take a position, then go from there. If you wanted more advice on what to do when you are trading, then I can't help you too much there. Only that be careful of technical analysis. Warren Buffet got to be the richest man, investor, in the world, and it wasn't due to buying a stock because the RSI was in oversold territory.

Contrary to the opinion here, I wouldn't recommend you read rich dad poor dad. Unless you wanted tips on personal finance, and even if you did there are better books I think; I've heard better things about The Millionaire Next Door, even the Richest man in Babylon up until the end of the chapter The Gold Lender of Babylon.

 

Very nice response. I'm currently in a Microeconomics course at my university so that is giving me some basic knowledge along with my own personal research on things such as Investopedia, WSJ, Yahoo, etc.

Like you said, it'll come with time. I already know so much more than I did when I created this thread and it's only increasing.

 

Check out "financial peace university"

It helped me get my personal finances settled.

 

I've heard great success stories of Ramsey and how people fall in line behind him. Kinda cool to read some of the things and how they worked out.

 

What are your intentions for learning?

What are your goals? And your time commitment?