When investing, I like to buy shares in companies that I have had dealings with in the past as a supplier. I feel that this gives me a better understanding of the company’s culture. While I have been dealing with many businesses while working in several countries, in the interest of a diversified portfolio, this range of stocks is not broad enough. ‘etoro’s “research” feature is a helpful starting point on US listings, but I prefer the valuations provided by onvista (a subsidiary of Commerzbank AG) and boursorama (mainly for French shares) and PCbolsa for Spanish companies.
For short selling I tend to check UK stocks with shorttracker, US stocks on generally accessible sites as the wsj, volumebot and shortsqueeze. I check German shorts under the Federal Bundesanzeiger.de publications for “Leerverkäufe”.
The starting point for looking into a particular stock is often company news, political and economic developments, technological advances or trends. Checking Wall Street Journal’ market data centre, Reuters and the FT are must read sources, in addition to a last second check on Twitter for latest updates help to see where the money is moving and why.