Feature: Editors' Top Picks

Once a year we present our top picks for the most common areas of investment analysis and management. While we rate and compare a wide range of programs and Web sites on an ongoing basis, this annual review allows us to present our personal favorites with the typical investor in mind. Portfolio management, mutual fund screening and analysis, stock screening and analysis, and technical analysis and charting are the most popular investment segments, so we highlight our top selections for both Macintosh and Windows systems, as well as top Web offerings.

We have not limited our selections to the boundaries of software that needs to be purchased and installed on your computer (disk-based programs); traditional and Web-based tools were eligible for the top-pick slots in each area. This issue is of special importance for Mac users who often find that Web-based tools for screening and analysis exceed the usefulness and functionality found in the best Mac-based software programs.

The Selection Process

The top picks represent the personal favorites of the editors of Computerized Investing. They are top-rated software programs and Web sites that we use ourselves on a day-to-day basis and can recommend to our members without hesitation. We have rated all our picks using our standard scoring system and have tried to select products that meet the needs of the typical investor.

The software programs and services were judged in each of the following categories: performance, documentation, and ease of use. Performance rates how well the program or service accomplishes its stated objectives. Adjustments are made for specific areas such as fundamental screening, where the performance of the screening process is graded separately from the depth and quality of the data provided by the application. Documentation rates the quality of the printed materials, on-line help, and manufacturer support. Ease of use rates how simple the core application is to install, learn, and operate. Criteria are rated on a scale of one to five, with five denoting the best score possible. While all the factors are important, the greatest emphasis was placed on performance.

We have eliminated several software applications that are simply not geared toward the individual investor market. These products, which we consider professional software, go beyond the scope of the research and analysis conducted by the individual investor and, therefore, become quite expensive.

The top picks presented here are not simply the most expensive products, or those with the most complex set of features. Rather, they are what we feel are the best products suited for the typical individual investor. Some of the programs are general purpose in nature, while some others are more advanced applications. Most on-line tools pale in comparison to the sophistication and capabilities of software, but on-line selections here are quite sophisticated Web tools.

Portfolio management systems help investors by tracking the performance of individual investments, the interaction of the investments in your portfolio, the allocation and classification of your assets, and the performance of your overall portfolio. They also function as important accounting systems that track the income and gains or losses on your transactions to help calculate the tax liability of your portfolio activities. No matter what techniques you use to select your investments, you must have a system in place to track your holdings.

The ability to specify security lot assignments for any given transaction is an important feature found in the top programs. If you reinvest dividends from your mutual funds and stocks, you will find yourself tracking numerous lots (units traded) over a long period of time. Top packages automatically match buy and sell lots for different accounting strategies for the purpose of reducing tax exposure.

Portfolio return reports paint the clearest picture of how well your investment holdings have performed. The top programs should help you analyze the performance of individual securities, asset groups, and your portfolio.

Captool Individual Investor By Captools Co. $249 (20% discount for AAII members); www.captools.com (800) 826-8082

Performance 5 Documentation 3 Ease of Use 3

Captool Individual Investor is the top Windows pick for the investor looking to monitor and evaluate their portfolio holdings. Captools offers a number of versions of the program ranging from the Individual Investor version priced at $249 to a Professional release that sells for $5,000. Captool Individual Investor comes with 12 months of support and program updates. Support and updates cost $60 annually after the first year.

Captool features just about everything an individual investor could ever want or need when tracking and evaluating a portfolio or group of portfolios. The coverage of securities handled iscomplete: stocks, mutual funds, annuities, bonds (fixed, zero coupon, variable, treasuries, munis), cash, GNMAs, CMOs, real estate, partnerships, options, and user-defined securities.

Transactions handled by the program are extensive. A partial list includes buy/sell, short/cover, margin purchase, return of capital, cash and stock dividends, interest, phantom interest, capital gains distributions, reinvestments, splits, reverse splits, premium and discount bond amortizations, fees, commissions, spinoffs and mergers. Captool provides complete tracking and computation of cost basis. Users can assign the lots manually or have the program automate the process to minimize taxes or maximize gains. Taxes are estimated based upon customizable tax rate tables. Securities can be marked as tax-exempt on federal or local levels.

Report capabilities are extensive and flexible. Captool ships with over 60 report templates that draw from a wide range of data fields and portfolio statistics. Captool reports also provide you with the option to incorporate pie charts and valuation growth charts.

The program can examine the performance of individual securities, security groups, and the overall portfolio for user-designated time periods. The performance report can present the internal rate of return, time-weighted rate of return, or simple profit on an annualized or total return basis. Users have the option of examining returns on both an aftertax and pretax basis and even specifying the fees or commissions paid over the reporting period.

Captool provides integrated Internet data downloads from many popular Web sites.

Captool is a powerhouse application. However, this type of software reporting strength and power can bring with it a great deal of complexity. It takes some time to learn how to use Captool to take advantage of its extensive set of features.

Quicken 2005 for Mac By Intuit, Inc. $69.95 www.quicken.com (800) 952-2558

Performance 4 Documentation 5 Ease of Use 5

Quicken is the classic personal finance program that handles all aspects of financial planning and tracking from checkbook management to portfolio management. Quicken is the only true portfolio management software option on the Mac platform, as it has been for some time now. Quicken software is also available for Windows.

Intuit updates the program on an annual basis and the Mac updates over the last few years have focused on deeper analysis of investments and support for a wider range of security assets and transaction types.

When the program is first installed, Quicken prompts the user to answer a series of personal questions. The first questions deal with how you intend to use Quicken—to save more money, get out of debt, manage your checkbook and bills, track investments, see where your money is going, or to ease tax preparation. After completing these questions, Quicken asks for financial information. For instance, if you choose to use Quicken to manage your checkbook and bills, the program will ask which institution you bank with and what your current account balance is.

Quicken also provides advice on how to achieve any goals you establish, including long-term goals such as building a house, taking a vacation, or buying a car.

Quicken will automatically update investments such as mutual funds and 401(k) plans, as well as taxes. Quicken does this in the same way that it monitors bills and checking accounts—by continually downloading investment information from brokerages.

Quicken’s investment management module enables you to compare your performance versus market benchmarks. Morningstar ratings are incorporated into the program. News alerts keep you up-to-date on news stories regarding your holdings. A capital gains estimator shows you the potential tax impact of selling your stocks and mutual funds before you make a trade.

With recent updates, Quicken for the Mac has risen to the upper echelon of portfolio management software and is the editors’ top pick for the Mac.

GainsKeeper Investor By GainsKeeper, Inc. $49—$149/yr. www.gainskeeper.com (617) 472-3314

Performance 4 Documentation 5 Ease of Use 5

GainsKeeper goes beyond the portfolio monitoring function located on most Web sites to provide a complete portfolio tracking and evaluation system. GainsKeeper allows you to track all of the transactions in your portfolio and automatically adjusts your cost basis for mandatory corporate actions and wash sales, while calculating and characterizing your capital gains for tax reporting purposes.

GainsKeeper provides standard portfolio monitoring that tracks a wide range of securities and transaction types including stocks, mutual funds, options, bonds, cash and user-defined securities. GainsKeeper is able to aggregate data from a range of financial institutions. Data can also be imported from software programs such as Quicken and Excel. As an Internet application, it’s capable of automatically adjusting a range of corporate actions—such as stock splits and dividends, mergers, spin offs, liquidations, name changes, reorganizations, and return of capital.

GainsKeeper allows you to examine your asset allocation and provides diversification tools for rebalancing strategies.

Pre-trade analysis helps to reveal the implications of your actions. Advice for year-end tax minimization is provided, along with “sell grades” to identify which lots to sell first.

Reports are customizable and include an IRS Schedule D report that can be imported into tax preparation programs.

GainsKeeper offers various subscription levels, priced by the number of transactions entered into the system. A one-year Investor subscription costs $49 per year and covers 100 transactions. If your trading activity exceeds your service level, additional Trade Buckets can be purchased at any time.

With over 15,000 mutual funds to pick from, many investors turn to mutual fund screening systems to select their funds and track the performance of their holdings. Screening involves setting up a list of parameters, or criteria, that you can use to find a group of funds that have similar characteristics. While you could use a financial newspaper, magazine, or newsletter to perform basic screens, the screening process is most easily accomplished using a computer.

Software packages offer some form of data service with the screening capability built into the software. Subscribers receive periodic data updates; a software program is worthless without these data updates. Likewise, the data is only as useful as the flexibility and power of the program’s screening function.

Mutual fund screening systems enable an investor to quickly locate a few funds that meet personal risk, return, and management style needs. For example, if you determine that your portfolio is lacking real estate investment trust (REIT) diversification, a screening program can quickly come up with a list of no-load mutual funds that have consistent performance above the average for REIT funds and that have acceptable risk and below-average expenses.

Morningstar Principia Mutual Funds Advanced By Morningstar, Inc. $1,095/yr. for monthly updates; $795/yr. for quarterly updates Morningstar Principia Mutual Funds $595/yr. for monthly updates; $445/yr. for quarterly updates www.advisor.morningstar.com (800) 735-0700

Performance—Screening 5 Performance—Data (Advanced) 5 Performance—Data 4 Documentation 4 Ease of Use 5

Morningstar’s screening software combination is the clear choice for the investor who desires powerful screening and comprehensive mutual fund data. Morningstar covers the full open-ended mutual fund database as well as exchange-traded funds.

Morningstar supports two versions of their mutual fund screener: Principia and Principia Advanced. Both programs cover 15,500 funds. Principia provides over 150 fields, all of which are available for screening and ranking. Principia Advanced is geared more toward professional investors and investment advisors. It features more than 1,000 data fields, with over 150 available for screening and sorting as well as the Advanced Analytics package that provides “under the hood” details and insightful information on individual funds. Principia Advanced also features more than 1,500 printable Mutual Fund data pages. The extra data and reports are what actually separate the two applications. Otherwise, the screening tool and the primary data set are similar—a key consideration when choosing between these two software siblings.

Both programs feature the presentation tool Portfolio Developer, which allows users to construct hypothetical illustrations of portfolios. Both also integrate with other database subscriptions covering assets such as stocks, allowing users to analyze a portfolio of stocks and funds together.

The Principia programs offer an annualized return for the trailing 12-month period and individual performance returns for the last 10 years (15 years for Advanced), as well as returns for the latest month and latest quarter. The programs include risk measurements and a nice array of portfolio information. Web links give users direct access to Morningstar advisory reports via an exclusive Web site.

Both programs include an easy-to-use, on-screen filtering utility and even display Morningstar’s equity and fixed-income style boxes in their main database pages. The team of Principia programs does an excellent job of fund screening and analysis and continues to solidify Morningstar’s position as an industry leader in the world of mutual fund data and screening applications.

Morningstar.com By Morningstar, Inc. Free with any PC with Internet access Premium Service: $11.95/mo. or $109/yr. www.morningstar.com (800) 735-0700

Performance—Screening (Premium) 5 Performance—Screening 3 Performance—Data 5 Documentation 5 Ease of Use 5

With no screening software currently available for the platform, the top pick for the Mac user looking to screen and research mutual funds is the Morningstar Web site. Much of the site is free, but Morningstar.com also offers a Premium Service subscription that includes an expanded screening module for fund searching. A 14-day free trial of Premium Service is currently available.

Screening is performed via the Fund Selector module and research is best conducted via the popular Morningstar Quicktake reports. Reports provide returns for several years, along with a comparison of performance to a market index and against funds with the same investment objective. Risk measures and Morningstar ratings are included for various time periods. The portfolio section of the report details items such as the fund style, top holdings, asset and industry breakdowns, and percentage of foreign holdings. Morningstar analysis rounds out the report.

The free Fund Selector screening tool is a simple-to-use application that features a 15,500-plus fund database. The 19 fields available for screening are more of a standard offering. The free Quicktake report features over 250 pieces of data on each mutual fund in the database. The Premium service also provides access to proprietary analyst reports that extend the discussions on individual fund prospects.

Additional mutual fund screening and comparison tools available for free at Morningstar.com include a quick-and-easy Fund Quickrank screener and a Fund Compare utility, which allows you to evaluate funds against one another, testing for better returns, higher ratings, and more.

For the individual investor looking to conduct basic mutual fund screening, the free services at the Morningstar Web site should work just fine. However, if you are looking for more a multi-dimensional fund screening experience, check out the Premium Service.

Screening programs help you sort through thousands of stocks to find a few that warrant further study. The top packages examine a wide universe of stocks, supply a deep set of information for examination and screening, and provide a great deal of flexibility to match the screening parameters to your personal investment philosophy. The packages should also have a wide range of pre-programmed filters to illustrate the screening process and help get users started more quickly.

Many investors use fundamental screening systems as a framework in which to investigate investment tips in an organized, consistent fashion. Company and industry data within a stock screening system can provide an initial impression of a company and its prospects.

Stock Investor Pro By the American Association of Individual Investors $247/yr. ($198/yr. for AAII members) www.aaii.com (800) 428-2244

Performance—Screening 5 Performance—Stock Data 5 Documentation 4 Ease of Use 3

[Note: Stock Investor Pro is published by the American Association of Individual Investors.]

Stock Investor Pro is a Windows-based program that offers complete monthly CD updates as well as weekly on-line updates. The program provides the most powerful screening tools of the top three choices coupled with a deep set of data and a wide range of built-in screens.

Stock Investor contains fundamental data on 8,000 companies. Comparison information on 12 sectors and 100 industry groups is included. The program allows you to look up, analyze, and screen for companies meeting specific criteria on over 2,000 variables. Consensus earnings estimates are provided by I/B/E/S and fundamental data is provided by Reuters/Multex/Market Guide.

The program includes detailed income statements, balance sheets, and cash flow statements for seven years and eight quarters. Financial statements can be viewed as reported or on a per share basis, a period-by-period percent change basis, or a common size basis. Stock Investor Pro provides over 300 ratios and growth rates and allows the creation of 250 custom variables.

The screening function enables screening for companies meeting criteria using any data field in the program, along with comparisons to database or industry norms. The program includes over 55 predefined screens that follow the techniques of well-known investors. You can create portfolios and print out predefined or custom reports. Data can be exported into a number of text, spreadsheet, and database formats.

Stock Investor Pro also comes with SSG-formatted files that can be used in InvestWare’s Investor’s Toolkit analysis program.

Wall Street City By Telescan, Inc. Free with any PC with Internet access Advanced ProSearch features: $9.95/mo. www.wallstreetcity.com webmaster@wallstreetcity.com

Performance—Screening 4 Performance—Stock Data 5 Documentation 5 Ease of Use 4

Mac users do not have any software options for fundamental stock screening and analysis, so investors must turn to the Web. The top-rated Web site, CNBC on MSN Money, presents a more basic version for the Mac, making Wall Street City the best choice for Mac users. But Windows-based users should also take a close look at Wall Street City, especially if they are looking for a rich array of technical screening indicators. Wall Street City is a comprehensive investment Web site providing a wide range of data and services—everything from free portfolio tracking, news, market updates, and basic search tools to a rich array of charting, screening, and company research tools.

The site offers the greatest range of screening tools among the Internet sites. You can opt for a rich collection of predefined screens using both fundamental and technical approaches, or you can create and test your own screens.

The HTML-based screening tool is free, while a more advanced Java-based screening module costs $9.95 per month.

The flexible and powerful Java-based screening allows users to combine up to 40 criteria at one time from the 700 available technical and fundamental screening criteria. Criteria can be weighted to create custom company scores. Notably, users cannot save their screening criteria for use at a later time, which reduces the performance rating by a point.

Wall Street City includes a unique backtesting feature that analyzes the historical success of a screen with various holding periods and market-capitalization concentrations. Telescan tracks the performance of its predefined screens and reports on the performance of these strategies. What’s Working Now identifies the best- and worst-performing stock groups and predefined stock screens. The predefined screens cover a wide range of fundamental and technical screening strategies and show the filters that make up each screen, a list of passing companies, historical performance charts, and statistics for the strategy.

CNBC on MSN Money By Microsoft, Inc. Free with any PC with Internet access moneycentral.msn.com/investor (800) 426-9400

Performance—Screening 5 Performance—Stock Data 5 Documentatione 5 Ease of Use 5

Microsoft and CNBC offer a complete personal finance and investing site through their free Web offering. The investing section offers portfolio tracking, charts, news, educational articles, stock and mutual fund research, and brokerage services. Access to articles, news, screens, company and mutual fund data, and portfolio tracking is free to all Internet users. Navigation between the various modules is easy and logical. The research and screening module on the site is top-notch. Thirty-two predefined screens are available and users can construct their own screens. The screening flexibility is above average among Internet vendors, even stronger than most of the disk-based services. The screening editor is an ActiveX program that we were able to run on Windows-based systems using either Internet Explorer or Netscape browser. On Mac systems, however, CNBC on MSN Money displays a more basic Web-based screening module.

The company coverage is both broad and deep. Over 200 well-chosen fields are available for screening. Users can compare company values against constants, other data fields, or even another company or industry benchmark. Screens can be saved for later use.

CNBC on MSN Money has pulled together the content of Camelback Research, Media General, Multex, Thomson, and Zacks into a comprehensive company report. The research wizard walks an investor through the factors to consider when looking at a stock, including its fundamentals, price history, valuations, catalysts, and competition. StockScouter ratings provide risk/reward recommendations for stocks. Another unique feature is the Advisor FYI Alerts, which alert users to factors that may influence a stock’s price—such as an earnings estimate revision, a price-earnings ratio in the bottom 25% of the industry, or increasing relative price strength. The Insight segment of the site provides a wide range of articles that discuss stock-picking techniques and current market events. News articles are posted daily, with historical articles archived by topic.

CNBC on MSN Money offers most investors a very good base to perform screening, company research, and portfolio management.

Investors looking for technical analysis software or services will not find themselves wanting for choices. There are literally hundreds of technical analysis programs on the market today, ranging from simple charting software to trading platforms that generate buy and sell signals based on technical indicators or even astrological cycles. We present top software picks that excel in plotting charts and indicators, developing and testing a trading system, and technical screening. In addition, we present a top charting Web site that offers a solid collection of charting choices and technical indicators as well as technical screening and in-depth technical analysis education.

These top programs plot a wide range of charts and indicators. The most common chart types are bar and line. Line charts normally plot the closing price over time, while bar charts typically show the open, high, low, and closing prices for a given period. Other chart types include candlestick, equivolume, and point & figure. A technical indicator, such as a moving average, is the mathematical manipulation of price and/or volume displayed in a graphical manner.

Ultimately, most investors will use technical analysis to aid in timing buy and sell decisions. Trading systems apply a set of buy and sell rules—usually based on technical indicators—and automatically indicate when these rules have been triggered. The trading rules can be a single indicator or groups of indicators matched to specific conditions. Backtesting a trading system involves applying it to a set of historical data in order to test its performance, measuring factors such as the rate of return and identifying each buy and sell. This allows you to see which transactions would have been made based upon the signals generated by the system as well as how successful and risky the strategy would have been over a given timeframe. Taking the process one step further, some of the higher-end technical analysis programs allow you to optimize trading systems, which generates the optimum (most profitable) parameters for a given trading system. However, backtesting only provides a glimpse of how the system would have performed over the specified testing period. There is no guarantee that the trading system can duplicate this performance going forward.

Technical screening involves locating securities that exhibit certain technical properties, such as price and volume behavior, moving average breakouts, chart patterns, or overbought/oversold conditions based on indicators. Users specify the universe of stocks to screen and the criteria they wish to include in the screen to obtain the list of securities. Coupled with screening is the ability to receive alerts when certain “technical” events occur.

As is generally the case when comparing the features and functionality of software versus Web-based services, technical analysis Web sites tend not to offer the same level of power and flexibility as their software-based cousins. While they tend to offer adequate charting and technical analysis indicators, they typically do not offer features found in high-end technical analysis software—namely system development, testing and optimization, and technical screening. However, they serve as an excellent stepping-off point for someone new to the field of technical analysis.

MetaStock By Equis International $449 (software only); software & Reuters Datalink: $59/mo. or $599/yr. www.metastock.com (800) 508-9180

Charting & Indicators 5 Trading Systems 5 Screening 5 Documentation 5 Ease of Use 5

MetaStock stands as one of the industry leaders in technical analysis software. Its powerful mix of charting capabilities, technical indicators, system development and backtesting, and ease of use has made it a top choice among trade publications, seasoned technicians, and novices alike for many years.

The program offers over 150 technical indicators and studies as well as the capability to modify existing indicators or to create your own (the Equis Web site, www.equis.com, has an extensive library of custom indicators to add to the software). MetaStock offers a wide selection of charting styles and unparalleled charting capabilities, with nine different charting styles from which to choose. Users can easily manipulate and customize charts using the program’s drag-and-drop features. Price plots, indicators, and chart windows can be moved within chart windows by simply clicking on the elements and dragging them into another chart or window. MetaStock offers 26 predefined trading systems and allows you to create and save your own systems. The recently enhanced system tester allows for wide-ranging backtesting and optimization of pre-defined and custom trading systems, and provides detailed system performance reports to analyze the effectiveness of a particular trading system.

If you are looking for securities that are exhibiting specific technical characteristics, the program’s explorer function allows users to compare, filter, rank, search, and list multiple indicator values for multiple securities. Users can view a list of securities that are generating buy or sell signals or that have broken some predefined barrier in terms of price or technical indicator. It can also run additional explorations on the results of a previous exploration, run explorations on a single security, or use separate security lists for each exploration. MetaStock contains 36 predefined explorations and offers the ability to generate custom explorations.

Beyond providing the tools needed to perform the analysis, Equis and MetaStock provide users with a wealth of educational materials to allow them to get the most out of technical analysis. The Equis Web site includes the complete text of Steve Achelis’ (founder of Equis) book “Technical Analysis From A to Z,” an excellent primer to the technical indicators found in MetaStock. The site also offers a collection of troubleshooting tips and technical support. In MetaStock, the expert advisor displays the trends of noted technicians that identify bullish, bearish, and neutral zones on a chart. Furthermore, the expert advisor can identify and label 31 candlestick patterns and users can create their own expert advisories and apply them to any chart they wish.

Since data plays such a pivotal role in technical analysis, it is beneficial to be able to “shop around” for a data vendor that meets your needs in terms of both data coverage and cost. MetaStock’s Downloader program can access data directly from Reuters DataLink, Dial/Data, and Telescan.

ProTA Gold By BeeSoft $199 (ProTA Gold) www.beesoft.net (800) 840-3588

Charting & Indicators 5 Documentation 5 Screening 3 Documentation 4 Ease of Use 5

While MetaStock has garnered numerous accolades over the years, ProTA Gold has seemingly gone unnoticed among technicians, although the Mac program is on par with the leaders in this area of investment analysis software. However, the program has quietly established itself as one of the most complete technical analysis packages available for Mac users, in addition to being the most reasonably priced for the features it provides.

For data handling, ProTA Gold allows for direct data downloading from Dial/Data. The program also comes with a universal text importer that can recognize and import data files in a number of different formats—including MetaStock, Excel, and ASCII text. With this utility, users simply drag a data file onto the ProTA icon and it will be converted for use with the program. The only major data issues to keep in mind are that neither ProTA Gold nor the text importer automatically handles stock splits, mutual fund distributions, or futures contract rollovers.

ProTA Gold offers all of the popular chart types—line, bar, candlestick, and point & figure. In addition, the program comes with over 50 fully customizable technical indicators and line studies. With its object-oriented interface, ProTA Gold allows users to click on an item and modify it to fit their needs.

With the portfolio tracker module, users can enter buy or sell trades and display, analyze, and rank them in a number of ways. The program generates such statistics as cost basis, return on investment, profit/loss, and more. Users can track technical information such as moving average values and volume activity, as well as enter trade entries and exits and track overall portfolio performance.

ProTA Gold also offers advanced features that are usually exclusive to high-end technical analysis packages with much higher price tags. If you are not satisfied with the existing library of technical indicators, ProTA Gold gives you the added flexibility of creating an unlimited number of custom indicators. The BeeSoft Web site also provides a library of custom indicators for use with the software.

For those interested in creating trading systems, ProTA Gold offers that functionality as well. Users can specify trading rules for entering long and short transactions. Once a trading system has been developed, users can plot buy and sell points on a chart, generate trade lists and performance summary reports, and optimize the trading system.

ProTA Gold will scan for securities meeting specified criteria. Users may specify one or several technical or performance-based variables and the program scans the database or a portfolio to find those securities that fit the parameters. The securities that pass the scan are then placed in a portfolio sheet where the results can be viewed and ranked.

StockCharts.com Free to $30.95/mo. ($9.95/mo. extra for real-time quotes/charting) www.stockcharts.com

Charting & Indicators 5 Trading Systems NA Screening 4 Documentation 5 Ease of Use 5

Many individual investors who wish to make use of technical analysis but are new to its concepts are in need of a service that allows them to get their feet wet without being washed away by the costs that are generally associated with software-based applications and the associated data costs. Furthermore, such investors need quality educational materials to familiarize themselves with the basics of charting and technical analysis. For this reason, we include StockCharts.com—an Internet-based technical analysis service—as our top Web pick in this area.

For charting, StockCharts.com offers one of the best collections of charts available on the Internet. The site features line and candlestick charting, as well as three options for point & figure charting. For point & figure charts, pattern alerts are automatically displayed on all charts (both free and subscription). The site offers a collection of over 20 technical indicators and line studies; users of the free service can plot up to two price overlays and two technical indicators per chart, while subscribers can plot up to eight price overlays per chart and up to 24 technical indicators per chart. Users can create charts with up to three years of daily data for the free service, or from 1990 for the subscription-based service. Subscribers to the site can save charts to a favorites list for future analysis (one for Basic service and up to 100 for Extra!).

StockCharts.com offers a collection of stock scans that allows users to apply various technical formulas to a stock universe to produce a listing of stocks meeting those criteria. Non-subscribers can run predefined scans based upon technical indicators as well as candlestick and point & figure patterns. Subscribers can create custom scans, however, only Extra! subscribers may save these custom scans and view the results of custom scans in their entirety. All scans screen stocks traded on the Nasdaq, NYSE, Amex, and Canadian exchanges as well as mutual funds.

For those looking to learn more about technical analysis, the site hosts an extensive collection of educational content at the Chart School. Articles cover the basics of technical analysis, as well as trading strategies and technical indicators and how to use them. There is also a discussion of charts, the common patterns that appear, and how to interpret them. A recent addition to the site is John Murphy’s Market Message. Murphy, a well-known technical analyst, publishes his market observations at the site (a market message subscription runs $16.95/mo.).