Wednesday 18 October 2017

Different Methods To Improve Trading and Investing Skills: Courses and Subscription Services

Courses

Besides online and offline trading/investing courses, there are also subscription services available that that the "hardwork" out of trading/investing. I do not like courses that doesn't include any kind of after support. I prefer mentorship programs with ongoing support. If the course cost thousands of dollars, it better has some kind of support after that. A few days course or some online training videos would not be some holy grail that turn you into a trading or investing guru. There are a lot of free workshops that we could attend where the trainers would "sell" their courses. I did attend 1 such seminar where the trainer said with his method it would take 15 min to evaluate a financial report. Imagine if I am to go through 5 years of annual reports for 1 company, it would take me more than an hour! Even after going through all that hardwork, I might have done some miscalculation somewhere along the way. With that said, such free seminars could be useful to pick up some education.

Subscription Services

There are some courses that would upsell you a subscription service after the course has ended. Even after attending a course that teaches fundamental analysis, some of us may find the entire process tedious. Like I mentioned earlier, it is also possible to make calculation mistakes on our own. Most people would not enjoy reading financial reports after a day's work. Such paid subscription services could be 1 or 2 year and the service would provide you a watchlist of companies that fit their investing criteria. They would also inform you when it is the right time to buy a certain company. My personal thoughts is they are actually quite worth it if you have a lump sum of money ready to invest. Of course, do not dump all money into a single company. Spread the money into a number of companies suggested during the subscription period.

In case you are still skeptical, let me share the result of one company which I would never have bought if I didn't subscribe to such service. The company was under their watchlist. I made my own decision to buy after I read up on the company's annual report and financial statements. I am still holding and if I sell this company shares now, it already cover back my fees. Of course, such services are not 100% right all the time. If you follow them when they bought, there could still be some companies that lose money. But having a diversified portfolio would increase the chance of profitability in the long run. Such services are also useful if you just want the hassle free approach to investing. I still like to do my own study though.

Screenshot from Stocks.Cafe

Regardless of courses or subscription services, it is crucial to take action after signing up. If not, it would simply be a waste of time and money.

To be continued...

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