Your First Step to a Prosperous Future
Investment Basics
What You Should Know
Before you invest, it’s important to be as informed as possible about securities and markets. Further, you must stay informed and monitor your portfolio.
This Financial Guide tells you what you need to know about markets and securities, and provides some basic suggestions on choosing an investment. The world of investing can seem mind-boggling for a beginning investor and the amount of information required to be consumed can appear daunting.
How do you decide what type of security to invest in? For example, should you choose stocks, bonds or some combination of investments? Should you invest in mutual funds? How do you choose a particular fund, stock or bond? How do you assess the risk to your money?
This Financial Guide provides a starting point for inexperienced investors. It describes how securities markets work, what protections are afforded, the general types of securities available, the interaction of risk and reward and how to select the investments appropriate for your risk tolerance.
For a definition of the various terms used in the investment world, see Glossary of Investment Terms.
