The stock market is a phenomenal way to build wealth, as it allows an investor to place their money in a vehicle that automatically makes more money. At least, for investors who know what they’re doing. A beginning investor may start out lucky or unlucky, but if they focus on great companies, chances are they’ll do just fine over time with their common stock trading. Looking at the best companies—those that can consistently grow their earnings and cash flow, and who often pay a dividend and provide investors with robust trading volume— a few well (and not-so-well) known names make the list....

What a Well-Balanced Portfolio Should Look Like Investors who are just starting out in the stock market either take one of two paths.  If they’re risk-averse, they may start investing with a mutual fund or ETF, which owns many stocks and makes management decisions on their behalf. The most common of these funds are index funds, which follows a specific stock market index on Wall Street, such as the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the S&P 500 Index, or the Nasdaq. For individual investors who want to play the markets more aggressively, however, they may start investing in individual st...

How to Form a Selling Strategy Most investors think a lot about what to buy, when to buy, how much to buy, and how much to pay. Whether they use a value investing strategy or are more trading-oriented, most of the focus on investing comes before shares are ever bought. But that’s only half of investing. The other half? Knowing when to sell. As with buying, there’s no one set answer. It will likely come down to your personal risk tolerance, asset allocation, financial goals, and investment strategy.  It may also include factors such as whether or not you’re trading penny stocks, or if...

Far from the world of small cap penny stocks are the big, safe names in the investing universe. Dubbed the blue chips, these companies tend to be industry leaders with the size and scale to continue delivering reasonable rewards for shareholders from modest growth and dividends.  The top blue chip stocks of Wall Street may not sound as exciting as smaller plays, but as part of your portfolio, they can provide steady returns. While they may not have the high return of the growth stocks on the Nasdaq, and more likely dominate the Dow Jones Industrial Average, bought at the right time, thes...

The biotech space is hot right now. And it’s likely to continue that way for some time. This is a rich space where investors can find market-beating potential far beyond the more traditional names that tend to dominate Wall Street. The best biotechnology stocks come in a variety of shapes and sizes. Some may focus on treating an individual disease; some may have many. Some are penny stock startup companies; others are dividend stocks. Most trade on the Nasdaq, but a few are considered blue chips and trade on the NYSE. Many are owned by institutional investors, but some of the top performers...

Investors looking for the next “big thing” in investing are likely to find what they want by seeking out small cap stocks. Small caps are a somewhat flexible term, but any company with a market capitalization under $1 billion is definitely one.  In today’s world, with some companies having trillion-dollar-plus valuations, even $10 billion could be considered small, although after that, you start to get into the mid cap category. Some are growth stocks with a high earnings yield, others are value stocks as determined by fundamental analysis. And not all small caps are penny stocks, as many s...

The stock market has had an incredible ride this year, and with many workers now stuck and home and with sports events cancelled or delayed indefinitely, chances are the ride will stay wild.  That’s because this year’s events have resulted in a confluence of new investors.  Whether they’re simply folks finding more free time during working hours or someone finally willing to try out the stock market with a stimulus (or unemployment) check, there’s been an explosion in small retail investors this year. A few are even skipping straight to futures or options trading, more obscure corners of...

Oil. Black gold. Texas tea. However you refer to it, it’s still a product in hot demand, even in a world seeing lower and lower costs for alternative energy. While the oil sector can be cyclical, it’s also tied to the economy. So it’s no surprise that oil has had a tough year, with Brent crude prices going from $60 at the start of 2020 to negative $40 as traders needed to get out of futures contracts, to a pop back to $40.  That’s an overall move off the lows of $80 per barrel, and chances are with a gradual economic recovery, oil and gasoline demand will remain robust and higher crude o...

Artificial Intelligence may still sound like something out of science fiction, but it’s already a reality. And its uses are only increasing. While it may not be as dynamic and robust as human intelligence, it can take over and improve processes in nearly every walk of life. For consumers, that may mean interacting with a virtual assistant or the facial recognition technology to unlock their cell phone, to say nothing of the programmed intelligence of video game characters. There’s no single AI system, so much as an amalgamation of different programs. That makes the AI market broad and open ...

From oil derricks to wind farms, nuclear plants to solar panels, there’s a wide variety of energy out there in the world. Some of it is finite, other sources are renewable. There’s even a sector of alternative energy to consider as well! That’s created a dynamic market sector that encompasses everything from power generating utilities to companies that explore and develop fossil fuels, with some exciting new technologies along the way. There are massive companies that are big players on Wall Street that trade on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), and penny stocks that just started up on th...