# Online Investment tools?



## brian276 (9 Apr 2008)

I have never invested in shares before and I am considering the Irish stock exchange. During the course of my research I have encountered free online tools for the American Markets, these allow you to list the traded shares by various criteria, Market Capitalisation for example.

Are there any such tools for the Irish Market?


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## Daithi7 (8 Mar 2010)

I have a follow-up query on this. I am a value investor and am currently finishing Ben Graham's excellent book 'The Intelligent Investor'. In this he outlines several criteria for a value investor to consider before investing in a share such as:

-valuation based on 7 year trailing p/e
-current dividend rate
-historical dividend rate
-price verus NAV
etc

I was wondering is there a good software or on-line research tool out there that would sift market data according to above criteria and others to throw up good candidate shares and etfs to invest in for a value investor?

What tools do regular equity investors and analysts use here for instance??

Thanks for all replies,
Daithi


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## camel (8 Mar 2010)

Check this out. It only looks at nasdaq though I presume:


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## jack2009 (8 Mar 2010)

Daithi7 said:


> I have a follow-up query on this. I am a value investor and am currently finishing Ben Graham's excellent book 'The Intelligent Investor'. In this he outlines several criteria for a value investor to consider before investing in a share such as:
> 
> -valuation based on 7 year trailing p/e
> -current dividend rate
> ...



Bloomberg machines


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## Daytrader (9 Mar 2010)

www.digitallook.com ( has investor tools to sift through stocks)
www.hemscott.net (has tools to sift through stocks - find momentum plays or growth or income plays)
 ( see what hedge funds are holding in their portfolios..they cover filings for Buffett etc...pretty good stuff for the value investor...
Also check out seeeking alpha's hedge fund section  ..they pull together alot of great stuff from other sites ..

For etfs..check out ... ETF trends here and ETF Dashboard


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## anuj21k (10 Mar 2010)

I dont think so, www.Goodbody.ie/ www.ise.ie , can be a starting point.

Beware before investing in Irish shares even Buffet has lost money investing in them


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## Daytrader (10 Mar 2010)

I suppose I should have spelt out in my previous post for anuj21k.

1. I am not recommending blindly following anyone elses investment style (hedge funds etc). The sites I proposed are for information purposes only. *Always* do your own research. 
2. I didn't recommend Irish shares and I would recommend the op redefines his/her scope and look outside the Irish Stock market too for any potential investments. Maybe take a look at different ETFs that encompass a good degree of diversification. 

Certainly I would be against sticking money in the Irish Market when so much of it is tied to bricks and mortar. 







anuj21k said:


> I dont think so, www.Goodbody.ie/ www.ise.ie , can be a starting point.
> 
> Beware before investing in Irish shares even Buffet has lost money investing in them


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## Peters (12 Mar 2010)

This one have better options
sec.gov/investor/tools.shtml


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## Daithi7 (10 May 2010)

Following my search for good stock screening tools according to set criteria:

I came across some tools on the Nasdaq website to screen stocks according to various 'guru's' valuation systems e.g. Graham, O'Shaughnessy, Etc. This is a link to the page, its quite cool and they explain the underlying methodology behind each approach:

http://www.nasdaq.com/reference/guru.stm

Let me know if anyone has sourced something better or similar that analyses more or all markets. Enjoy!!


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## PeterBrennan (10 May 2010)

Daithi,

That sort of stuff - guru stock picks etc - is just nonsense. Walk away and save your money.


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## Daithi7 (10 May 2010)

Hi Peter,

Thanks for that. Why is it nonsense in your opinion?

If these stock screenings are being done according to, say, Graham's Value Investing Criteria( as this is the only set I've actually read up on properly), then surely this presents a baseline list that you can go away and do further analysis on to pick stocks that are likely to be good value with good margins for safety and hence perform well over the medium to long term??

I'm fully aware that these lists could produce 'value traps', that is stocks that look like good value but are priced at those levels for very good reasons. But as a tool to produce good candidate shares for further research I would have thought these tools are very useful- Yes /No /Maybe???


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## PeterBrennan (10 May 2010)

The way the  market works is it rewards the 'smart money' and punishes the 'dumb money'. Do you believe the market is going to reward somebody who gets stock picks from a website? Does that sound like 'smart money' to you. 

Have a read of some of the stuff on my website Daithi plus I will be at the  Wealthbuilding talk tomorrow if you want to hear it first hand.


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## Daithi7 (11 May 2010)

PeterBrennan said:


> The way the market works is it rewards the 'smart money' and punishes the 'dumb money'. Do you believe the market is going to reward somebody who gets stock picks from a website? Does that sound like 'smart money' to you.
> 
> 
> > Peter,
> ...


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## PeterBrennan (11 May 2010)

Daithi,

I am afraid you misunderstand some basics. 

Markets are more predictable over the short term (because of overbought/oversold conditions) than the long term. 

If you had bought the S&P index 10 yrs ago, how much would you have made. Answer: negative even without discounting for costs. 

The rest of your post regarding good companies is just a primitive inductive fallacy.


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## Daithi7 (11 May 2010)

Peter,

This is Ben Graham's take on the manic character he terms Mr Market.

_“Common stocks have one important investment characteristic and one important speculative characteristic. Their investment value and average market price tend to increase irregularly but persistently over the decades, as their net worth builds up through the reinvestment of undistributed earnings. However, most of the time common stocks are subject to irrational and excessive price fluctuations in both directions, as the consequence of the ingrained tendency of most people to speculate or gamble”._ 

- Benjamin Graham 

That 'primitive inductive fallacy' as you term it, is good enough for Warren Buffet so its good enough for me too


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## PeterBrennan (11 May 2010)

Well good luck with trying to make money in the market armed with a bit of waffle like that. 

Its a bit like a local football manager armed with a quote from George Best thinking he is going to take on Man utd.


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## Daithi7 (11 May 2010)

Thanks Peter,

With all due respect both your analogy (and investment philosophy) is fundamentally flawed. I'm not trying to take on Man Utd, I just want to buy a stake in it at a good price with a high margin of safety and sit back and watch george best & his descendents do the business.

As an alternative I could adopt your investment philosophy which is buy in and out of Man Utd every other week or day according to how many went through the turnstiles that day.... mmm I wonder which approach is likely to be more successful??

Let me see Graham, Buffet and Co recommend the first approach and who exactly recommends the second??? oh you is it!?


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## Rory Gillen (13 May 2010)

In Daithi7's defence, he is articulating his investment style well and I see little point in deriding that. If Mr. Brennan is more comfortable trading markets which he feels are more predictable over the short term then fine. But Mr. Brennan must also acknowledge that his route is fraught with much greater risk for the majority - that trading short term is a zero sum game. Perhaps he is on the winning side more times than not, and good luck to him if he is. But it is not correct to argue that that approach can be followed by all.

Trading assets is a different practise to owning assets and owning assets is the essence of investing. Mr. Brennan is correct to say that holders of equities have simply lost money in the past ten years. They have because equities were grossly overvalued in 1999. It will be more helpful on this site if one does not make things personal !
To Daithi7 I would say that it is possible the site I run might be of inyterest to you, you can sign up for a free weekly email to get a flavour of what the site offers. Currently, for memebers, I am running a series on the US Global consumer franchises as they look as cheap as they have been in many years www.investRcentre.com


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