| Everyone wants to know how to find a great stock | | | | - Industry: Oil & Gas Drilling & Exploration |
| to purchase. Where do you go to find such | | | | Example #3: Large-Cap Dividend Companies |
| information? Who can you ask? Whom do you trust? | | | | Let's say you want to find a large company that |
| While there are no guarantees when it comes to | | | | pays a solid dividend. You could setup your screener |
| picking companies or predicting prices, there is a tool | | | | with these options: |
| that is popular and helpful. It's called a screener and it | | | | - Market Cap: 10 billion or higher |
| can help you search through thousands of companies | | | | - Dividend: 8% per year or higher |
| with the parameters you are looking for. | | | | Narrow the Results |
| Screener Options | | | | After running your screener you may end up with |
| Screeners can give you an infinitely-long list of | | | | hundreds or thousands of results. You can narrow |
| parameters to set for the search. The most common | | | | the results down by adding more parameters or |
| parameters include Share Price, Trading Volume, P/E | | | | making the ranges smaller. Once your list is small |
| Ratio, Industry, Dividends, Market Capitalization, and | | | | enough you can start doing research on the individual |
| others. | | | | companies and learning more about them. Look at |
| Example #1: Microsoft-type Companies | | | | their short-term and long-term charts to make sure |
| Let's say you want to find a company similar to | | | | they are going the direction you want them to. Also |
| Microsoft. You could setup your screener with ranges | | | | see what the professional analysts are saying about |
| close to MSFT: | | | | these companies. |
| - Share Price: $20 to $30 | | | | Where to Find a Screener |
| - Volume: 50 to 75 million shares per day | | | | There are many screeners on the internet and most |
| - Industry: Application Software | | | | of them are free. Nearly every online brokerage has |
| - Exchange: NASDAQ | | | | one, although you may have to have an account |
| Example #2: Low P/E Oil Companies | | | | with them to use it. You can find a simple stock |
| Let's say you want to find an oil company with a low | | | | screener at HowTheMarketWorks or a more |
| Price to Earnings (P/E) ratio, poised for growth. You | | | | extensive one at Yahoo! Finance. |
| could setup your screener with these options: | | | | Other Screeners |
| - P/E Ratio: 10 to 15 | | | | There are several different types of screeners out |
| - Volume: 1 million shares per day or higher | | | | there, including ETF's, Mutual Funds, and Bonds. |