Personal Finance

Reliable information is an essential part of making informed investment decisions. FINRA and other industry regulators offer free tools and resources to help investors research investment professionals, firms and products with confidence.

When it comes to securities investing, market liquidity refers to how easily you can buy or sell an investment at a fair market price when you want to. When a security is illiquid—meaning it has low market liquidity—finding a buyer when you want to sell might be difficult. You might have to accept a lower price if you need to sell quickly. In some cases, you might not be able to sell at all if no one is willing to buy at a price you’re willing to accept. If you want to buy an illiquid security, you might have to pay a higher price or wait longer to find a seller.

When a hot company is in the news, it might be tempting to take advantage of offers to invest before it goes public through an initial public offering (IPO). That’s what “pre-IPO” investing promises: a chance to buy shares of a private company before it lists on a stock exchange. 

If you’re offered early access to shares of a popular private company or a fund that claims to own shares of the private company, be aware that these transactions carry significant risk, and some are outright scams designed to steal your money. 

When it comes to securities investing, market liquidity refers to how easily you can buy or sell an investment at a fair market price when you want to. When a security is illiquid—meaning it has low market liquidity—finding a buyer when you want to sell might be difficult. You might have to accept a lower price if you need to sell quickly. In some cases, you might not be able to sell at all if no one is willing to buy at a price you’re willing to accept. If you want to buy an illiquid security, you might have to pay a higher price or wait longer to find a seller.

Mutual funds and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) are two products that investors commonly choose to include in their portfolios. These investments have important similarities as well as notable differences.

When researching retirement and other types of investment accounts, you might see terms like "pre-tax," "tax-deferred," “tax-free” and "tax-exempt" used to describe the tax treatment of certain types of account contributions, earnings and investment products. Understanding these terms can help you make investment decisions based on your personal needs and circumstances.

Here’s an introduction to some commonly used terms:

As you journey with children from ABCs to adulthood, investing for their future can help to build a strong foundation for the years ahead. The earlier you begin, the more time the funds can benefit from the power of compounding, where money earned from investments can generate additional returns over time. 

Have you ever received a text or voice message from someone claiming to be an investment professional and requesting confidential personally identifiable information? Have you seen a video posted on social media featuring a known celebrity promoting a “fantastic” investment opportunity? Has someone who sounds like a family member called with a frantic ask for you to wire them money? Videos and calls like these might look and sound real, but they might actually be scams using deepfakes and vishing, two rapidly evolving cyber threats facing investors today. 

If you’re an avid trader, you might be pursuing—or thinking about pursuing— a strategy involving frequent, intraday trading. Investors who actively trade securities, including stocks or options, throughout the day might attempt to profit from small price movements, typically related to volatile stocks, and often make these trades using margin. However, some active investors might choose to implement a frequent trading strategy in cash accounts as well. 

One consideration when investing is whether to put your available funds to work all at once or over a period of time. If you choose the latter route, you might opt for an investment strategy called dollar-cost averaging.

With dollar-cost averaging, you invest your money in equal portions, at regular intervals, regardless of current market conditions.