How to Use the Google Finance Search Tools
Stocks and the stock market is a fast-paced world to keep up with. In order to stay ahead of the game, you’ve got to be organized, aware of what’s going on, and have easy access to the latest financial news. The Internet has quickly become the number on means of getting and sharing information immediately. This is crucial for keeping up with finance. Furthermore, websites like Google.com have additional tools and resources to stay updated and informed about the financial market. Google Finance is a branch from Google.com that focuses solely on the financial information and news that is so vital to you.
To access Google Finance, click “more” at the top of the page on Google’s homepage, then click Finance. On the home page of Google Finance is five tools that will help you stay updated and organized. Here’s a brief description of how to use each of these tools:
*Markets*
This is a great way to get a quick overview of the current position of global markets. The top section, “Market Summary” shows articles from leading stock market analysts and is updated quite frequently. You will see a link to the original article, a summary, who provided the information, when it was posted (in minutes), and include a picture of any grafts or images were included in the article. This is a great way to see what the latest news is, and decide from there if you want to read the full story.
The next section in the “Markets” tool is the top news stories relating to the market. Under that is the “Sector Summary” showing the increase or decrease percentages for stock in certain sectors, like Basic Materials, Conglomerates, and Energy. The last section in “Markets” is a basis analysis of market trends, including for categories:
* Popular-showing the trends for the most popular, most researched corporations and businesses.
* Price-showing the top 5 stocks that are currently gaining and losing percentages.
* Mkt Cap-showing the top 5 gainers and losers with the highest market cap.
* Vol-showing the top 10 stocks with the highest volume.
*News*
Basically, this is a listing of all the news stories about the market. The news is listed in the order that they were posted with links to the original article, a summary, and the company that provided the information. To the right is a subsection of “Top Stories”, to see the most popular news stories.
*Portfolios*
You must have an account with Google to use this section. This is where you can organize your current stock investments. You can add ticker symbols of the stocks and mutual funds you are purchasing or watching, add transaction data, etc. You will then be able to track your progress and see recent activity in your stocks.
When you add a stock to your portfolio, either to watch or buy shares, you will then see a basic preview of the stocks, and have the option to see the overview, fundamentals, performance, and transactions (shown is separate tabs) for each stock.
*Stock Screener*
This tool will help you get information on current stock. You can search for stocks based on their market cap, P/E ratio, Dividend yield, and 52w price change, or a combination of all or some of these criteria. You will then be shown a list of matching stocks in alphabetical order below. Each stock is a link to a page summarizing this stock’s detailed information, like shares and recent activity, etc. From here you can click to watch the stock, which automatically adds it to your portfolio. Under the basic summary is a listing of related companies that you might also be interested in, including their current status.
*Google Domestic Trends*
This tool will show you trends of searches performed on Google by US users, compared to the actual sales in that area. Since the majority of Internet users use search engines to gain information, and Google is the number one (by far) search engine used, this could be a valuable resource. You can compare the rise and fall of searches performed on Google to actual purchases to see a different prospective on the popularity of certain markets. There are several market sector categories to choose from, like computers and electronics, durable goods, and real estate.
For all your finance and stock market needs, check out Google Finance!
Google Spreadsheet Budget Vs Microsoft Excel Budget
Which one do you use?
It’s clear that having a personal finance budget on a spreadsheet is an effective approach to handle your money. But should you be using Microsoft Excel or Google Docs as a means?
Advantages of Using Microsoft Excel For Your Personal Finance Budget
Excel is the most popular spreadsheet on the market; as a result, more people use it as a means of budgeting than any other spreadsheet option available, even Google Docs. But what are the advantages to using Excel?
1. It has the most functionality – Excel does the most. Period. There are thousands of customizable options,
formulas, colors, structures, and formats that you could create using Excel. No other spreadsheet program does what Excel can do. What does that mean for your budgeting? Well- if there’s something you would like to see done, chances are Excel can do it.
2. It’s the most popular – Because Excel is the most widely used program on the market, it allows people to get help on formatting and creating formulas that you probably couldn’t get on other programs. The internet has tutorial after tutorial on how to create a budget on Excel.
3. It’s quicker and more dependable than Google Docs – And that is very true! Sometime Google Docs goes down or moves very slowly. It’s dependent on the internet working well. If that is not the case, you won’t have access to your budget. Excel is a software program, and if your computer runs well, then you’ll always be able to access your budget.
Advantages of Using Google Docs For Your Personal Finance Budget
Google docs has several advantages. Following are just a few:
1. Access from anywhere – You can get to your Google Docs from anywhere because how it’s accessed via
the internet. Google hosts your information for free, and makes it available to you whether you’re sitting at home in your office or on a business trip to Europe. You can access and edit your budget from anywhere using Google Docs.
2. Easy to learn & use – Google Docs is much like Microsoft Excel, so using it and learning it is going to very easy if you’re thinking about making the switch. It’s not nearly as complex as Excel, so you’ll be able to pick it up in 10 or 15 minutes.
3. Free – Google Docs isn’t going to cost you “one red cent.” If you don’t already have the Microsoft Suite, you’ll have to spend a fortune to buy it. It doesn’t make sense to spend a large sum of money on a means to greater financial security, does it? Use Google Docs because it doesn’t cost a thing.
How to Read a Stock Quote
Frustrated by all the symbols in a stock quote? Here’s a basic overview to reading a stock quote on Yahoo Finance.
If you’re like many new stock market investors you are learning all sorts of new things, one of the many things you need to know is how to read a stock quote.
Yahoo Finance has a nice stock quote page, please follow along and go to this web page http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=msft and find out what everything means.
Near the top of the page it will tell you that you are looking up Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) this tells us what company we are looking at. You will then see the last price (which is delayed 20 minutes) and you will see how much the stock has gone up or down for the day.
If you scroll down the page you will find a table with a bunch of data.
Last Trade: This is the last trade that happened on this stock (delayed 20 minutes)
Trade Time: This is the date or the time of the trade
Change: Amount the stock traded up or down in dollars and percentage
Prev. Close: The amount the stock closed at the last day it traded. Generally the day before, unless holiday or weekend
Open: Price the stock opened at today or if weekend or holiday last day it traded
Bid: What various investors are looking to buy the stock for at the current moment
Ask: What various investors are willing to sell the stock for at the current moment
1 yr Est: Estimate for the stock’s price in one year’s time
Day’s Range: The range in price the stock has traded that day
52wk Range: Stock price from low to high over the past year of trading
Volume: Number of shares of stock traded so far today
Avg. Vol (3m): Average number of shares traded each day for the past 3 months
Market Cap: This is the market price for the company take the number of shares outstanding and multiple by the price of the stock
P/E: Price to earnings ratio
EPS: Earnings per share
Div & Yield: The dividend (if any) that you could receive from the company for owning stock
Those are the basic items on that Yahoo finance page; you can also find charts, headlines and some more background information on the company.