PCs and the Web Make the Job Easier Than Ever

Until a few years ago, it was tough for individual investors to do technical analysis because it was time-consuming and expensive to get current stock information.

The picture couldn’t be more different today. Thanks to the advent of personal computers and the World Wide Web, small investors can easily access up-to-date stock charts and other technical indicators. Better yet, much of the basic information is free.

A good place to start is The Times’ Web site (https://www.latimes.com). Click on Business and scroll down to the Investing subsection. From there, enter the ticker symbol of any stock and, once the information is displayed, click on Retrieve Mode. That gives investors the option of calling up a variety of charts, including minute-by-minute, daily and weekly charts.

Many other Web sites have charting capabilities as well. Online discount brokers, for example, routinely offer charting functions to their customers.

One of the more popular Web sites devoted to technical analysis is BigCharts (https://www.bigcharts.com). Besides providing basic functions, the site allows investors to do such things as graph a stock and a market index on a single chart to compare relative performance. The site is free.

*

Technical analysis software programs offer a range of features for beginners and experts. These programs work in tandem with Internet sites, which are used to download up-to-date information on stock and market movements.

Worden Bros. Inc. in Durham, N.C., sells two programs under the TeleScan 2000 name (phone: [800] 776-4940). TC 2000 Version 3.0, the lower-end program, tracks all stocks on the three major U.S. exchanges, 7,000 mutual funds and popular market indexes. It sells for $29 plus $5 shipping.

Here’s TeleScan’s pricing formula for Internet updates: The first time an investor charts a stock, he or she incurs a one-time cost of 39 cents. Each daily update of the security beyond that is half-a-cent for each day the market is open. Once the number of stocks an investor tracks hits 200 or more, the maximum update cost is 99 cents a day or roughly $20 a month. Version 3 gives only end-of-day data. For advanced investors, TC2000 Version 4.0 offers intra-day data as well as other features, such as free access to the company’s Web site. It costs $39 plus $5 handling. Updates for an unlimited number of stocks cost $2.49 a day.

For investors willing to shell out more for a software program, there’s MetaStock 6.5 by Equis International ([800] 882-3040). The software costs $349, plus roughly $30 to $35 a month for updates. It offers several advanced features, including a screening program to identify stocks meeting selected technical criteria.

There are many books about technical analysis for investors who want to learn more.

For beginners, “Martin Pring’s Introduction to Technical Analysis” (McGraw-Hill, $49.95) combines a book and CD-ROM tutorial. It walks investors through the basics and includes a series of interactive quizzes for users to test their newfound knowledge. For more advanced investors, Pring’s “Technical Analysis Explained” (McGraw-Hill, $49.95) offers 500 pages of in-depth analysis.

“Technical Analysis From A to Z” (Equis, $29.95) was written by Steven Achelis, the founder of MetaStock’s parent company. It walks investors through the myriad technical indicators and explains how to use each one.