The Motley Fool is the name of a financial website that started in 1993, although it is now a lot more. From its early origin as the idea of two brothers in Virginia, the Motley Fool has developed into a multimedia financial services company which gets its point out via its web sites in the USA, the UK and Australia; books, newspaper articles, TV appearances and newsletters.
The publicity on their website says that the firm took its name from Shakespeare, who said that the king’s fools were allowed to tell him anything without fear of being beheaded, as long as it was in an amusing manner. The Motley Fool may have lost its head.
For while their personal investing advice is as helpful as anything else you will perhaps read anywhere, the comedy can become a bit tortured.
However, the advice is sound and the structure of the site with its discussion boards leads to many exciting, topical debates by knowledgeable (and much less well-informed) investors all keen to put in their two penn’orth.
There is info on most aspects of personal finance on the web site, ranging from loans to investments like stocks, shares, bonds and savings funds.
The web site is full of with hints and tips on how to make and invest money. You will find recommendations on things like finance software, dividends, stocks, and how much you should become saving from your monthly salary.
There are regular features on other aspects as well like which is the best electric or gas company, getting out of debt and credit repair. Another feature is their interest in stocks, shares and mutual funds.
The team at Motley Fool are managing a ‘million dollar portfolio’ of their own real money on line and members of the website are permitted to watch, discuss and duplicate each transaction.
Just a limited number of individuals are permitted in at any one time, so you may find this feature closed to you, but you can put your name down to be told if a space comes up.
In the meanwhile, you could become a member of one of the CAPS Contests which mock up gambling on the stock exchange with imaginary money in mock portfolios. That is, you play with make-believe money, but the prizes are real enough.
These contests are immense fun and the best fashion of being able to learn about the stock exchange and market movements without it ruining you.
All in all, it worth adding the Motley Fool to your list of Financial Favourites because there is such a lot of free financial knowledge there which seems to come from the heart of the managing, owner brothers and their colleagues. Sure, they get commissions on everything and attempt to sell a pro version of the web site, but there is still loads of free info there too.
One word of warning though: whilst the financial advice and suggested links are fairly good, do not go there expecting to have a belly laugh, because the comedy wears rather thin after around five minutes.
Owen Jones, the writer of this article, writes on a variety of subjects, but is now involved with Motley Fool. If you would like to know more, please go to our website at Mutual Funds