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[BlueTaylor]

How on earth do you get started?

How can you keep track on the price of the share to see if it goes up or down?

[Gibbo1]

www.shareprice.co.uk is great for that mate

Depends what your aiming do do with your investment, the markets are all over the place at the minute mainly due to the issues with the Greeks and  the spanish bailouts, ive got a bit in them and about 4 months ago had a pretty decent profit and now im sitting on a loss so I have to just sit it out.

Not ideal place to put cash if there is a chance you will one day need that money in an emergency

[johnymac]

Forex.com is a share trading platform . Capita deal with selling shares and you can find out the prices of ftse 100 , currency , gold and silver prices etc in most national newspapers.

Dangerous stuff though if you aim to trade daily.

[Tito]

Pharmaceutical companies like Glaxosmithkline are always worth looking into because they spends millions on research drugs for alzheimer's, cancer and other illnesses and diseases. If they have a break through drug that slows down a illness it normally sends there share price through the roof.

[Dexter_Morgan]

Its actually fairly easy your local bank Clydesdale I used to have my share account with actually do a share accounts where you can buy and sell I don't know about rates or anything but they were always pretty good.

[Heathen]

www.selftrade.co.uk

I would be very careful with trading shares - you need to understand exactly what you're doing and how to assess the fundamentals of a company.  Be prepared to ride out a dip in share price and look for companies that grow their dividends each year - that suggests good corporate discipline

[BlueTaylor]

Just don't understand all the charges on the websites that are provided

[The Hurricane]

What are you looking to do mate?  There is a big difference between day trading, which effectively means you have to be glued to the computer during trading hours and you're using it to earn your income and investing over the long term.

If you are looking to invest long term it's really best to save up decent amount to invest in a single transaction.  If you buy small amounts at a time as an investment the charges will most likely negate the benefits of investing.  This does depend the method you use to invest it.

You might just want to look at a shares ISA.  It will give you easier access to your money but your money will still be based on how the stock market performs.

[BlueTaylor]

What are you looking to do mate?  There is a big difference between day trading, which effectively means you have to be glued to the computer during trading hours and you're using it to earn your income and investing over the long term.

If you are looking to invest long term it's really best to save up decent amount to invest in a single transaction.  If you buy small amounts at a time as an investment the charges will most likely negate the benefits of investing.  This does depend the method you use to invest it.

You might just want to look at a shares ISA.  It will give you easier access to your money but your money will still be based on how the stock market performs.

All I'm looking at doing mate is piling some money into a business and letting it sit there for a couple of years every site I've been on seems to be some sort of monthly charge for not doing like 10 dealings in that month

[The Hurricane]

I used to use Halifax Sharedealing years ago and I'm sure I only used to pay a fee per transaction and wasn't tied into a set number of deals. 

If you are investing, you should really be looking at having a portfolio across a range of sectors/industries.  Putting the lot into one company is very risky.

I seem to remember you are fairly young.  If you were looking at using that money for a deposit for a house or the like in the future I'd look at much safer ways of saving even though the interest rate at the moment is crap.

[BlueTaylor]

I used to use Halifax Sharedealing years ago and I'm sure I only used to pay a fee per transaction and wasn't tied into a set number of deals. 

If you are investing, you should really be looking at having a portfolio across a range of sectors/industries.  Putting the lot into one company is very risky.

I seem to remember you are fairly young.  If you were looking at using that money for a deposit for a house or the like in the future I'd look at much safer ways of saving even though the interest rate at the moment is crap.

That's it mate the interest rates at the bank is shocking at the moment and harderly getting nothing back for my money sat there a year, so if s to plow some of that money into a business I could earn more than what I would at the bank in a few years to be able to put it onto a house etc

I wouldn't mind paying a flat fee per trade but everywhere I look seems to be like £9-15 monthly fee if not making more than like 9 trades a month

[Bonters]

If you're looking at playing the stock market, apply the self same principle as you would on the tables in Vegas.  Don't invest anything you cannot afford to lose.  Right now, the markets are extremely unsettled and volatile, which means big losses and big gains can be made in the short term.  In the long term nobody can tell.  It always used to be the case that if you could invest long term (5 to 10 years), you were more or less guaranteed to be in profit (bear in mind NOTHING is actually guaranteed).  That no longer applies.  I put 20k into a stock market based managed fund nearly 12 years ago.  It's currently worth about £19k.  It's been down as low as £13k in it's lifetime and I keep meaning to cash it in as soon as it hits the break-even, but haven't remembered yet.  If you're looking to invest for a couple of years, and if you're looking to come out with more than you put in, I'd say avoid this kind of investment at all costs at present.

[The Hurricane]

That's it mate the interest rates at the bank is shocking at the moment and harderly getting nothing back for my money sat there a year, so if s to plow some of that money into a business I could earn more than what I would at the bank in a few years to be able to put it onto a house etc

I wouldn't mind paying a flat fee per trade but everywhere I look seems to be like £9-15 monthly fee if not making more than like 9 trades a month

I had a quick check on Halifax and it still seems to be a set fee (currently £11.95 per transaction).

If you are looking at getting a house I'd just look at using your ISA allowances and shopping around for the best interest rate you can find for other savings.  You could stick £10k in shares now and there's a chance it could be worth next to nothing in say 5 years when you would hope to be ready to buy a place. 

Really share investments are for rich old people like Bonters 

[Heathen]

I suggest that you would be better investing into index tracking funds rather than just into one company.  With the greatest of respect, if you don't understand the charges on dealing websites, you're not going to be able to assess the viability of a company.  I'm a financial planner but even I would feel uncomfortable in being able to do this without investing a large amount of time.

An index tracking fund allows you to 'pool' your investment with others and benefit from economies of scale.  The fund then buys all the companies that make up an index (e.g FTSE All Share) so you're not putting all your eggs in one basket, which is risky.  The fund buys the companies and you own shares of the fund - google mutual funds if you want more info.

It's important to not put all your money into one area (e.g UK Shares) and make sure you spread it about a bit, geographically and across asset classes.  Diversifying your investments reduces risk and should help to maximise returns over the medium to long term.

A 'typical' portfolio might be:

UK Shares - 20% (FTSE All Share index)
North American Shares - 15% (S&P 500)
European Shares - 10%
Far East Shares - 10%
Emerging Markets Shares- 5%
Corporate Bonds - 40%

I would stay clear of Government Bonds for the time being (Eurozone problems, Government debt).  You could do something like the above through a company like Hargreaves Lansdowns or do it more cheaply on an 'execution only' (no advice given) through a financial adviser, i.e you tell them exactly what you want and they 'execute' your instructions for you but benefitting from the deals that they can obtain.

Cash is delivering negative real returns (after inflation) at the moment which means that you're actually losing money by keeping it there.  Your £1 today won't buy £1 worth of goods in a years time.  Shares have historically been a good hedge against inflation although they are risky - we've just come out of an awful decade for UK shares but the fundamentals of companies look good going forward.