Starting Personal Account
I am a college student looking to start a personal trading account to invest in stocks. I want to be a public equities investor in the future so I want to know what its is like to have some experience and trade my own money to get some skin in the game.
My strategy is flexible with respect to investment horizon but I prefer ideas that have a longer time horizon to play out. I will be focusing on small to mid cap US companies but I would like to look at anything that is interesting and has enough information about it. Sectors will likely be tech/consumer (I know) and I will be pretty concentrated to 3-10 stocks at a time.
Any ideas about where can I get ideas for investments (good screening practices, websites with good stock pitches etc), good information (preferably free sources): 10Ks, market information, earnings day transcripts and just overall tips since I am pretty new. Also what are some of the best brokering accounts I can use for this that have low commission and will overall just be suitable for this purpose.
I know that I am going to be at a huge disadvantage to institutional investors because lack of time, resources experience etc so I'm not expecting to have crazy returns but I at least want to get some good reps and see if this industry is what I want to go in full time so I will really appreciate any help I get on this.
Kindly remind me if there is anything I forgot to include that helps in your response.
Bump
There’s way too much to talk about here. Read Michael Mauboussins expectations investing and you’ll have an idea of what you need to start learning.
Forgot to add. Going direct to buyside will require a sh*t-load of work. You need to lock in now if you want a realistic chance at getting in out of undergrad. 3+ hours a day of investing and studying. There’s less than 100 spots available for college graduates every year.
agree, ime buy-side is often those who traded / self-studied markets throughout uni. Not just 'broadly interested'. Lock-in if you want a shot
Yikes I must’ve been lucky. Got a mm offer and only started learning about equities and studying when I started interviewing
Thanks for the book rec, will check it out
On the resource front, obviously EDGAR and company IR pages will have your earnings releases, K’s, Qs, presentations etc. Places like BAMSec (i think they maybe still have a free version) will have transcripts. Depending on your school, they may have a bloomberg terminal where you can pull a lot of this as well as trading data, sellside research, and consensus estimates. Depending on where you set up your brokerage you can get access to specific sellside research platforms. For example, an etrade account will get you access to Morgan Stanley research. Koyfin is a “bloomberg light” product if you are willing to spend a little money to get some of the bbg functionality.
In terms of idea generation, there are tons of accounts on fintwit that talk ideas but to put it kindly the quality is mixed at best. Tbh a good filter is the more followers they have the lower quality the ideas are. VIC is a popular forum, again mixed quality but some good ones in there. You can also search for hedge fund letters, Third Point publishes theirs for example. The Sohn conference just happened and some of the pitches are on YouTube. For example, I thought the pitch on ATD.CN was actually pretty interesting. If nothing else, consuming some of these (and even much older pitches) will give you a better framing for what a stock pitch actually looks like and how the buyside thinks about a good investment.
I agree with the poster above re expectations investing. What a lot of inexperienced investors miss (I know i did) is understanding what is priced into a stock. Saying AI is going to be a massive opportunity for NVDA is not a pitch in and of itself. The goal of investing is to have a differentiated view that is not understood by the broader market. Building on this, it also has to be a key driver of the overall stock. If your variance is that expectations for widget earnings are 20% too low but widgets only make up 2% of total revs, its prob not going to materially change people’s view of the LT story
Ducimus nulla et sint aliquam. Necessitatibus quae aut sed. Eveniet eos et voluptate non laudantium ea magni. Officiis laboriosam optio ut id expedita.
Harum id animi eligendi tempore. Et quam officiis quibusdam ex molestiae vero. Itaque doloribus reprehenderit nihil quae nisi sit. Est consequatur eum iste et esse dolorem corporis. Ut dolor inventore iusto temporibus sunt ut. Fugit et dolorem sequi tenetur.
Illo itaque ipsa saepe veniam. Ut deleniti nesciunt inventore quaerat. Quaerat fugit atque expedita aperiam ducimus reiciendis quia.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...