| E: |
anyway, first, for me, as I told you, I don't know much about HK stocks. |
| Therefore, in order to start investment, let's look into a trustful online broker. |
| K: |
is normal internet banking good enough? |
| E: |
actually, this is a good questions, in HK, there are banks supporting online trading with even US markets. However, because the transaction fee is not cheap, therefore, in order to find an online broker, we need to consider the followings: |
| 1, reputation |
| 2, minimum amount to give |
| 3, transaction fee |
| 4, information and service provided by the company. |
| K: |
my cousin said it will be ard HK$50 per trasaction in hk |
|
but dunno that is for us or hk market |
| E: |
maybe, but also need to consider the service. As your cousin probably a trader himself, he probably could find something cheaper. |
| K: |
maybe, but i think he is quoting as a general. |
| E: |
ok, I have seen many information like this: |
| http://www.tradingwinner.com/archive/2006/06/27/choosing-an-online-stock-broker/ |
|
comparing Ameritrade, E*Trade, and Scottrade etc. |
|
| Indeed, I believe the price of the commission fee is also going down year by year, as long as you choose something: |
| 1, fixed commission fee |
| 2, support option account |
| 3, good if can buy bonds as well |
| 4, provide real time trading |
| 5, No yearly management fee |
|
| then should not vary a lot. |
|
afterall, giving $2000 deposit to open an account is a reasonable start, which is equivalent for you to buy a US stock with price $20. |
| K: |
how about user interface? will that be a big issue? |
| E: |
I believe all of them will provide real time stock quote, and even the UI is different from one to another, what you normally look at is the real time stock price and some charts. |
|
| for me, I don't think it is a big issue as normally before I buy anything, more or less I know which price I will buy. Apart from login to your online trader, you can get those information from various places, like internet, TV or radio. |
|
As long as your online broker can let you to place your bid at the price you want, and help you to execute when the price is reached. |
|
So that we don't need to up stay till the market close for US market trading. |
|
| That's another thing why I like to trade US stock, as it seldom affect my work in daytime. |
| K: |
but the problem has to be, how do u know the market in us? it is so remote. |
|
we may think one product is absolute rubbish (like most GM and Ford cars), but they sell like mad there |
| E: |
haha... yes, that's why we need to do 2 things: |
| 1, read those companies you are interested in. |
| 2, correlate market and industry news to the stock. |
| like rubbish cars, if you are interested, you should know why they sell a lot in US, and how japanese cars are eating up their market now. |
| even so, the stock price normally related to the expectation of people how to see the company, that means if you have strong reason which eventually will be shown in the balance sheet, you can make more money than those people who don't have that sense. |
|
ok, let's take a look at GM. |
|
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=GM&t=5y |
|
and ford: |
| http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=F&t=5y |
| and toyota: |
| http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=TM&t=5y |
|
it seems that GM and Ford are having the similar problem, and Toyota is getting very strong. |
| K: |
ha ha the trend is so clear |
|
it maybe suprise to know lexus a toyota brand is doing extremely well in the north america |
|
and u will be suprise which particular type of ppl is proud to have lexus |
|
wanna guess? |
| E: |
which type? |
| K: |
black american, yo-man, hip-hop, gangster to your suprise |
|
they think the car is "bling" |
| E: |
:O |
| K: |
and a few rap songs feature "lexus" in their lyrics |
|
and black american culture has been a big trend in america in the last 4/5 yrs |
| E: |
lexus was like japanese mercedes in HK le... |
| K: |
yes, very different marketing. i bet the jap ppl were suprised to hit this jackpot too |
| E: |
yup~ |
|
actually, the bounce back of both stock of GM and Ford shown the US internal market is getting well this year. |
| K: |
i think two yrs ago was the first time that american top 20 billboard were all filled up by songs that is black-american origin |
