June 4, 2007
Shares are for sharing say social-networking brokers
Ramping of shares on online bulletin boards and pump-and-dump scams made many investors shy away from the unsolicited financial advice available on the internet.
But Web 2.0 tools and websites are helping to restore some faith.
A number of sites, including Stockpickr.com, BullPoo, SocialPicks and FeelingBullish allow investors to compare each other’s portfolios, real or virtual, and track performance, share information, form groups and pick up tips.
Users can feel even more confident about the reputations of their fellow investors on a new wave of online brokerage sites offering social networking tools. On TradeKing, users can publish their own blogs, read RSS news feeds and make available their verified trading history.
Silicon Valley-based Zecco, which offers free trading, is taking this one step further with a service now in beta testing that allows investors to display their trading history plus their portfolio, with the percentage breakdown of different stocks held.
These come straight from Zecco’s database, establishing the veracity of any stock-picking successes that members claim. Zecco expects users to take this information to establish their own virtual investment clubs, sharing views with investors holding the same shares or with investment approaches in common.
It promises analytical "market guru" tools later this year that will slice up data to show information such as what the top-performing investors are buying on a particular day.
Zecco’s community of investors is small at 20,000 accounts, but is growing by 1,000 a week.
"It helps to talk to your peers about investment ideas," says Gabriel Dalporto, Zecco’s chief marketing officer, "Traditionally, stock-picking has been a very lonely process."
