Many individual investors aren't aw...

Many individual investors aren't aware of the wealth of independent investment information available at their public library. This article provides a brief introduction to the best sources of publicly-available stock market information for Canadians.

WHERE TO START

Before beginning your search, it helps to know a little about to what extent a library is organised. Almost all public libraries use the Dewey Decimal regularity to classify materials. These are the numbers ground on the spines of the volumes When browsing the shelves, the 332-333 range provides a advantageous selection of investment books. For instance, Benjamin Graham's classic, The Intelligent Investor, should be located at about 332698

Most library catalogues use Library of Congres enslave headings. For investment information, test selecting subject terms such as "stock market," "stock ownership Canada," or "stock price forecasting" to find the mostly pertinent material.

Also, the library may have what are called "pathfinders." These are usually one-page handouts in succession popular topics, such as "Researching a Canadian Company." These are great time savers, and will direct you to relevant sources and their exact location.

THE VERTICAL FILES

Most libraries will have file cabinets filled with collections of newspaper clippings, or magazine articles in succession various subjects. Business topics are generally arranged according to company and/or industry. The vertical files are a fit place to start if you are interested in novel developments in a company or industry.

GENERAL hint TOOLS

The Financial Post's observe of Industrials, and Survey of Mines and bottom Resources will give you the exemplar and number of shares issued on a company, as well as basic financial data. The Globe and Mail's Canada Company Handbook, provides similar information, including first note of the scale financial ratios.

Also available from the Financial office are the so-called "Card" service products: The Historical Reports (the golden cards), and the Investor Reports (the ghastly cards). The latter provides monthly updates to the Historical Reports. The cards provide the solution corporate data in an easy to read format and are popular with scholars taking the Canadian Securities Course. Unfortunately, barely the largest public libraries subscribe to these publications.

Periodical Indexes and CD-ROMs

Indexes provide you with an alphabetical listing of newspaper and magazine articles, and sometimes part reviews, organised by subject, title, or author. Probably the best index generally available for Canadian business articles is the Canadian Index from Micromedia. You can search here by dint of subject, but the most useful section of the guide is the Corporate Name Index, where you'll find intimations to newspaper and magazine articles about specific companies. HW Wilson's Business Periodicals Index is another popular source, if it were not that its Canadian coverage is scanty.

Be aware that a of the more obscure stock market publications won't be indexed check the effrontery of the volumes for integral list of the magazines an newspapers that are indexed.

ELECTRONIC RESOURCES

A pious electronic equivalent to the Canadian Index is the widely available CD-ROM effect Canadian Business and Current Affairs (CBCA), which indexes several hundr Canadian trade and business publications.

The Canadian BusinessDisc from Infomart is a relatively just discovered quarterly bilingual compilation of the business sections of Canada's major newspapers. Although single a third of the sections included are the full-text using the Business Disc is certainly far les time-consuming than searching for articles forward microfilm. As yet, few public libraries have subscribed to the BusinessDisc, however CBCA is available in many public and academic libraries. the one and the other of these products are extremely user-friendly. With a little practice, you'll be able to guard complex searches that aren't possible with the paper indexes. For instance, you can limit your search to a specific time frame, and then sort the terminates in the order or format you choose

For detailed financial data, as it was as you would find in a balance sheet, another CD-ROM Compact D/Canada, is worth a gaze Here, you'll find information forward over 8,000 public and private Canadian companies. Unfortunately, because of copyright restrictions, there may be limitations forward the amount or type of data you can print. It is frequently the case, as well, that you aren't allowed to transfer the information to your have a title to diskette.

Although convenient, electronic resources have any weaknesses. For instance, in a certain libraries, the poor computer displays and cheap printers may make reading or saving the information difficult. As well, in the library setting, you won't be able to use one of the most attractive features of the CD-ROMs--such as downloading data directly to a spreadsheet program.

PERIODICALS

The following magazines should be available at main library branches: The riches Letter, Investor's Digest of Canada, Canadian cash Saver, The Investment Reporter, and our acknowledge Canadian Shareowner. Only the largest concern libraries in cities such as Toronto or Vancouver will subscribe to the Canadian edition of The Value Line Investment scrutinize or Polymetric Reports. The general interest business magazines, of that kind as Canadian Business, or Business Week, can be institute at almost all libraries.