20 articles
Key Concepts
The big ideas behind investing, explained simply.
What a stock is
Owning a share means owning a small piece of a real business.
Stock exchanges and brokers
Where shares are bought and sold, and who places the order for you.
Going public: the IPO
How a private company starts selling its shares on the stock market.
Market capitalization
Market cap shows how big a company is in the eyes of investors, something the share price alone can't show.
Stock market indexes
An index follows a group of shares to show how a part of the market is doing.
ETFs and index funds
Funds that let you own many companies through a single investment.
Stock splits
A split changes the number of shares and the price of each one, but not what the company is worth.
The three financial statements
The income statement, the balance sheet and the cash flow statement, and what each one shows.
Company reports and earnings day
When companies publish their results, and why share prices often move that day.
Dividends and buybacks
The two main ways companies return money to their shareholders.
Valuation
Valuation compares the price of a company with what the business produces.
Risk
Risk is the chance that things turn out differently from what you expected, including losing money.
Uncertainty
Nobody knows the future. Good analysis helps you think clearly about it, not predict it.
Market ups and downs
Markets go through long rises and sharp falls. Looking at past ones helps put them in perspective.
Emotions and common biases
Money stirs strong feelings, and a few predictable thinking traps affect almost everyone.
Inflation and interest rates
Two forces from the wider economy that affect companies and share prices.
Diversification
Spreading your money across different investments so that one problem doesn't decide everything.
Compounding
When gains start earning gains of their own, growth builds up over time.
Long-term vs. short-term thinking
How long you plan to hold an investment changes which information matters most.
Investing in dollars from Brazil
When you invest in another currency, the exchange rate becomes part of the result.