You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an alternative browser.
You should upgrade or use an alternative browser.
InvesTools anyone?
- Thread starter peekaboo2yoo
- Start date
Quote from jlewisnc:
One technique I learned from the Thinkorswim guys is to do Bracket Orders.
The low number is my stop and the upper number is my sell. Once its set up you don't have to think about it as it's all automatic and they are real easy to do.
AWESOME! I do trailing % stops and was about to cancel them and try re-entering them in my first attempt at one-cancels all.
Bracketed - GREAT - thanks!
I went to the Investools free class and was a bit disappointed. They really, really push hard for you to buy one of the advance classes. The guy teaching the class literally started placing the advance packages on our laps. Basically I went to supposedly learn about stocks but went away with âYouâre crazy to invest in stocks, options is where the real money is, but you need to pay us about $20,000.â Also, one of the people helping at a table at the back of the room was telling students that to start with stocks you needed at least $50,000. Yeez, thanks for telling me beforehand so I would not waste my time going to a stock class that turned out to be an infomercial for options.
The person who first turned me to Investools was Phil Town, author of Rule # 1 (excellent book), but if you read some of his postings (just google him) youâll see he wrote that 90% of what you have to pay to get at Investools you can get for free elsewhere. Now I know much more about stocks and indeed you can find the same data at finance.goole.com, finance.yahoo.com, cnbc and other addresses.
Lastly, Iâd like to say that I also attended a free thinkorswim class. As someone else posted here before, thinkorswim itself does not seem to be to keen on Investools, and this is after they merged. The instructor told us he never uses charts, and had not really bothered to look at what his sister company Investools had to offer.
Unfortunately thinkorswim itself leaves a lot to desire in the âhelpâ department. As I did pay for the Investoolsâ service for a year, and started trading with TOS. I would say a good amount of the time I called TOS for help, they were rude to the extreme. They are a sight which expects the investor to know what he is doing, to be self directed so theyâre not set up to help with âdumbâ questions. Even Jim Cramer gave his âsell, sell, sellâ on the company a couple of weeks ago.
Finally, I do think Investools has a good methodology to offer, and do believe people can be successful, but they are simply to pushy with their selling, and way to expensive. Have you checked the stock (SWIM) lately?
The person who first turned me to Investools was Phil Town, author of Rule # 1 (excellent book), but if you read some of his postings (just google him) youâll see he wrote that 90% of what you have to pay to get at Investools you can get for free elsewhere. Now I know much more about stocks and indeed you can find the same data at finance.goole.com, finance.yahoo.com, cnbc and other addresses.
Lastly, Iâd like to say that I also attended a free thinkorswim class. As someone else posted here before, thinkorswim itself does not seem to be to keen on Investools, and this is after they merged. The instructor told us he never uses charts, and had not really bothered to look at what his sister company Investools had to offer.
Unfortunately thinkorswim itself leaves a lot to desire in the âhelpâ department. As I did pay for the Investoolsâ service for a year, and started trading with TOS. I would say a good amount of the time I called TOS for help, they were rude to the extreme. They are a sight which expects the investor to know what he is doing, to be self directed so theyâre not set up to help with âdumbâ questions. Even Jim Cramer gave his âsell, sell, sellâ on the company a couple of weeks ago.
Finally, I do think Investools has a good methodology to offer, and do believe people can be successful, but they are simply to pushy with their selling, and way to expensive. Have you checked the stock (SWIM) lately?
Quote from emilypaige:
I went to the Investools free class and was a bit disappointed. They really, really push hard for you to buy one of the advance classes. The guy teaching the class literally started placing the advance packages on our laps. Basically I went to supposedly learn about stocks but went away with �You�re crazy to invest in stocks, options is where the real money is, but you need to pay us about $20,000.� Also, one of the people helping at a table at the back of the room was telling students that to start with stocks you needed at least $50,000. Yeez, thanks for telling me beforehand so I would not waste my time going to a stock class that turned out to be an infomercial for options.
The person who first turned me to Investools was Phil Town, author of Rule # 1 (excellent book), but if you read some of his postings (just google him) you�ll see he wrote that 90% of what you have to pay to get at Investools you can get for free elsewhere. Now I know much more about stocks and indeed you can find the same data at finance.goole.com, finance.yahoo.com, cnbc and other addresses.
Lastly, I�d like to say that I also attended a free thinkorswim class. As someone else posted here before, thinkorswim itself does not seem to be to keen on Investools, and this is after they merged. The instructor told us he never uses charts, and had not really bothered to look at what his sister company Investools had to offer.
Unfortunately thinkorswim itself leaves a lot to desire in the �help� department. As I did pay for the Investools� service for a year, and started trading with TOS. I would say a good amount of the time I called TOS for help, they were rude to the extreme. They are a sight which expects the investor to know what he is doing, to be self directed so they�re not set up to help with �dumb� questions. Even Jim Cramer gave his �sell, sell, sell� on the company a couple of weeks ago.
Finally, I do think Investools has a good methodology to offer, and do believe people can be successful, but they are simply to pushy with their selling, and way to expensive. Have you checked the stock (SWIM) lately?
Emily,
As I have posted I felt the same way about Investools and would not recommend them because of the high cost of their beginning and especially the advanced classes. Many people I talked to at the 2 day class I attended were returnees that were still trying to learn what was taught. Unfortunately, some had paid for the advanced sessions.
I am like you and have found all the stuff that Investools offers free from other sites. I still use their site to quickly look at a stock, ETF, etc. but will not renew.
As for ToS, sometimes they are a bit brusque but I would believe that comes from the large amount of calls they take every day. I have to say that most of the ones I have talked to were very helpful. Try calling later in the evening after the market has closed. Maybe that will help.
Quote from emilypaige:
They really, really push hard for you to buy one of the advance classes.
Now I know much more about stocks and indeed you can find the same data at finance.goole.com, finance.yahoo.com, cnbc and other addresses.
Finally, I do think Investools has a good methodology to offer, and do believe people can be successful, but they are simply to pushy with their selling, and way to expensive. Have you checked the stock (SWIM) lately?
Hi EmilyPaige,
I agree about the 2-day (live) Basic Stocks class:
I took it last month, and I'd be interested to know whether we had the same instructor. Mine was Mark Larson.
Although some of the teasers that he gave us about Options and Advanced Technicals were interesting, he spent far too much time upselling. I did not purchase any advanced classes.
I agree about the Investools website:
So far, their 5-step method and their tools have improved my portfolio, and I very much like their *online* Basic Stocks course.
I comparison shopped (I'm female, after all) and the main reason I decided on Investools was: 1 Searches, 2 Industry Rotation (especially the Big Chart), 3 the Insider Trading screen that shows Institutional investment in a stock.
---
But of course I'd like to avoid paying $50 a month for their website after my 6 months end. Do you know any web sites that have something similar to the searches, Big Chart, or Institutional/Insider trading? That's what I'm really looking for.
Thanks!
Quote from Optimistic:
Hi EmilyPaige,
I agree about the 2-day (live) Basic Stocks class:
I took it last month, and I'd be interested to know whether we had the same instructor. Mine was Mark Larson.
Although some of the teasers that he gave us about Options and Advanced Technicals were interesting, he spent far too much time upselling. I did not purchase any advanced classes.
I agree about the Investools website:
So far, their 5-step method and their tools have improved my portfolio, and I very much like their *online* Basic Stocks course.
I comparison shopped (I'm female, after all) and the main reason I decided on Investools was: 1 Searches, 2 Industry Rotation (especially the Big Chart), 3 the Insider Trading screen that shows Institutional investment in a stock.
---
But of course I'd like to avoid paying $50 a month for their website after my 6 months end. Do you know any web sites that have something similar to the searches, Big Chart, or Institutional/Insider trading? That's what I'm really looking for.
Thanks!
Be careful of the institutional ownership info because you need to look at the dates as sometimes they are 3 to 4 months out earlier.
And I realized that my style of trading don't rely heavily on fundamentals so I almost never use the site for investing information. Once I changed from using Investools for investing decisions I started to make money.
As for alternatives to Investools, here are some of the ones I use to analyze stock picks-
http://www2.barchart.com/market.asp?code=BWINV"
http://ratings.thestreet.com/tools/basic/ratings.html?s=china
http://bigcharts.marketwatch.com/advchart/frames/frames.asp?symb=
http://www.investopedia.com/
There are plenty of others that offer valuable information for free. There are also some good ones that aren't too expensive and all have money back trial periods.
I suppose that Investools does work for some peoples style of investing as it is a very individual thing.
Good luck!
Concerning questions from my recent-mostly negative-posting concerning Investools:
My instructor for the free class was not Larson, I believe his name is Evan Smith.
Concerning the question of where to find info given in Investools, well, some of their stuff is proprietary, such as their under/over evaluation of the option price. Nevertheless this is not too hard to figure out. Always compare the price with the BlackSholes model's price, and of course, ideally find the options which are undervalue, but if you stay within 20% of the BlackSholes, it should be a good price.
My broker is OptionsXpress, and they have some great stuff. Their pricer is proprietary, but you can find it free at finance.yahoo.com, under options. I think this is one of their greatest tools.
Good luck to my fellow traders,
emilypaige
My instructor for the free class was not Larson, I believe his name is Evan Smith.
Concerning the question of where to find info given in Investools, well, some of their stuff is proprietary, such as their under/over evaluation of the option price. Nevertheless this is not too hard to figure out. Always compare the price with the BlackSholes model's price, and of course, ideally find the options which are undervalue, but if you stay within 20% of the BlackSholes, it should be a good price.
My broker is OptionsXpress, and they have some great stuff. Their pricer is proprietary, but you can find it free at finance.yahoo.com, under options. I think this is one of their greatest tools.
Good luck to my fellow traders,
emilypaige
Quote from emilypaige:
My instructor for the free class was not Larson, I believe his name is Evan Smith.
emilypaige
Oh, I mistread your post. You went to the free 3-hr workshop. My free workshop was a turn ON (especially the 3 tools that I still like so much) which is why I bought the $1K stocks class.
If they call you, I hope you'll tell them that the upselling was a big turnoff. (I did).
The fact that he's selling "back up" a gentler term for pirated copies of these applications should have given you insite as to the type of person you were dealing with. Since you paid with paypal, if you used a credit card (not debit), you may be able to cancel the transaction, but keep in mind, you may also lose your paypal membership.
Quote from snyking:
I sent $160 via Paypal and he sent me a blank DVD discs. He sent the mail with signature require and Paypal will not be involved with quality of product outside of eBay transactions. Paypal only helps resolve not received item. This guy knows this policy very well and abusing to people like me. Be careful.
"Hi,
I have backup copies of Investools DVD Courses for sale.
The following are backup copies I have. If interested please reply to email.
1) Investools Basic Options (4DVD + Manual)
2) Investools Advanced Options (6DVD + Manual)
3) Investools Advanced Technical Analysis (6DVD + Manual)
4) Investools Currency Trader (7DVD + Manual)
5) Steve Nison Profitting with Japanese Candlestick DVD
6) Steve Nison Secrets to becoming a samurai trader : Advanced candlestick DVD
Email me for pricing info. vicuob@yahoo.com Thanks"
Quote from cdcolvin:
The fact that he's selling "back up" a gentler term for pirated copies of these applications should have given you insite as to the type of person you were dealing with. Since you paid with paypal, if you used a credit card (not debit), you may be able to cancel the transaction, but keep in mind, you may also lose your paypal membership.
Why don't you send and e-mail to Investools to report him and what he is doing and perhaps they will pursue legal action to make him stop?