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Politics : Idea Of The Day -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Backfill who wrote (30304)	1/1/2000 1:43:00 PM
From: Bald Eagle	Respond to of 50167

Jeff, obviously you are new to trading stocks, so it is good you ask questions like this. I'll take a stab and invite anyone else to join the discussion. The bid is the highest price that the market maker or specialist has as what a buyer is willing to buy at. The ask is the lowest price that a seller wants to sell at. The difference between the two prices is known as the spread. The main significance as far as buying and selling a stock is as follows. If you put in a sell order "at market price" you should get the bid price or very close to it, at least for all well traded stocks. If you put in a market buy order, you will pay the ask price or close to it. As for the bid and the ask size. If they are large you should be able to get your order filled more quickly because there are lots of shares available at the bid and ask price. Hope this helps. Happy Y2K

To: Backfill who wrote (30304)	1/1/2000 6:24:00 PM
From: Logain Ablar	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 50167

Hi Jeff: I see you've received a partial answer. From your question I take it your just learning to invest and trade. I would recomend before you risk any capital you do some reading to help prepare. The time and effort put in up front will probably save you significant $$'s. Even in this bull market there is plenty of risk. When the bull turns it will be even more dangerous. I would recomend going to amazon.com and ordering Point & Figure Charting from Tom Dorsey and also books by Elder. You may also want to visit the Point & Figure Threads. P&F is an easy to learn technical analysis. There area others. My personal experience is to mix fundamental analysis with technical. The technical is the leading indicator in many cases. The FIRST rule of investing is to preserve capital. Once you learn this and how to manage risk in your own way you'll be fine. Remember the MM's are out to make as much as possible and we the retail investors are last on the food chain where they'll take all we're willing to give them. Don't worry about missing an opportunity they're are plenty of them around. Be careful what you read on the threads. Everyone has they're own style and it is easy to misinterpet their actions. SI has a wealth of information and most are willing to help. Ike is good on this thread but you have to be able to understand him. Of course all you have to do is ask and he'll explain. Good luck. Tim