Hi All,
I have been investing for the first time and since February I have invested just over Ā£500 in 15 companies trying to diversify my portfolio as much as possible.
Iāve enjoyed researching which companies to invest in but now I am wondering what is the best way to keep monitoring the companies I invest in? Obviously I go on the companies own websites but what other sites do you use to hear about news etc.
Just buy an ETF. No research required, will most likely outperform your pics, rebalances automatically and no need to keep up to date on anything while having more diversification.
Also, company websites are useless. Once a piece of information is on a company website, itās been in the news for days or weeks and is already priced-in. Companies only publish good news either, so it will just feed your confirmation bias.
You canāt keep on top of investments in 15 companies if you donāt do it full-time or professionally. Youāll always be late to the party.
Google finance is pretty good for collating news. And proactive investors for UK stocks, particularly AIM.
Subscribe to them on twitter etc, and any related twitter profiles like fans of the company etc as they might find stuff before it is everywhere. Probably more useful for big tech etc.
What is an ETF ?
Probably best to read this than someone explain 
Thanks Gary
I use lots of free UK based sites. I always use advfn.com free bulletin board to find out what is happening to my companies. Lots of good info is shared. each individual share has at least one forum and the usually contain daily and long term share price charts. Also can check news etc about my UK shares. I also create a calendar of results and dividend dates so that I have something to look forward to each month.
Thanks Carol. Iāll check this out.
Everyone has different methods so it is hard to tell to be honest. I have many stocks but use a principle of wether the stock is stable long term first and then I use data as my trigger. This means I donāt need to do too much research as I buy dips and my general % increases.
If I wanted to make huge gains then yes I would need to know my companies inside out but I am not investing that way. Example if Tesco, BP or another big/stable company has a dip on a day I buy more of that stock. It generally works out but I do have to follow the news but not study full time.
I also have stocks like Berkshire that I donāt review at all as I know they generally go north. All in all I have a safe diversified portfolio but use 10-20% on riskier stocks that I pay attention to on the DD.
Obviously that is just my method but my point is everyone is different and only you can decide what is best for you. If I just did ETFs then I would put money in and forget which would be worse than being involved as now I am interested I find I put more in my account.
The % may be lower than an ETF, it isnāt at the moment by a long way, but the balance is higher as I put more in if I am actively involved. I find I donāt buy a coffee but a couple stocks instead 
As for research I find the forum here a very good starter and then Yahoo finance for data and the news links on each stock below
it is a great free resource if you have a desktop/laptopā¦ the app is not so easy to navigateā¦ just wanted to add that you dont have to pay for any of the levels to access the free BB, and there is lots of info that you can access for free. I also use the free portfolio service as I have a stake portfolio and an isa with x-0 so I can see them all in one place easily.
good luck.
Thanks Gary. Your method is what I am essentially doing at the moment to a tee!
I just put in regularly what I used to bet on the football. Iāve got a lot more money and finding it a lot more fun. I have some funds in a couple of ETFs but they donāt interest me as much.
Thank you everyone for your replies.
I do find some undervalue the incentive angle of investing. It made me realise how much I wasted on pointless things
Depends where in the world youāre invested. You can pay for loads of detailed data, but I find much of that is for day traders (too stressful!). I use the LSE website for UK RNS and investing.com website or phone app to keep track of my investments.
Morningstar is good for research and tipranks for mainly US stocks.
Investing.com app works for me. I set up my portfolio on it so can get minute by minute moves on my phone which becomes a bit addictive. Doesnāt stop me sitting tight and concentrating on the long term tho. Free version has the occasional ad to click thru but other than that itās ok. Iāll add a vote for advfn forums. Very knowledgeable investors on the threads in my experience. Big percentage of my investments in ETFs as I only have time to track a few individual stocks.
I have mixed experience with Investing.com. On one hand itās a good platform, but I find it has some āweirdnessā - for example my VUSA ETF correctly records the number of shares and price, but it mis-calculates the decimal points when showing the market value. E.g. 300 shares @ Ā£57.06 = Ā£171.18 is plainly wrong!
Iāve found something similar, but itās the price thatās wrong by a factor of 100 in a couple of cases. In my portfolio I adjust the number of shares I own which kinda fixes it to show the correct total value and value movements. As a free service I find it great but to be fair there are a occasionally some small anomalies which have stopped me paying for the pro version.
I have a little in ETF, for me the challenge of finding my own shares to pick far out ways any financial gain opportunities.
Sure I want to make Ā£Ā£Ā£ but at the same time I want to enjoy the investment ride which ever way it goes.
Iām diverse in my portfolio although try and stick with UK companies as I want to invest in the country I love.
I do have a tiny holding in AMC though which is US.
I read investor chronicle every week, I like the style of the magazine.
I use Google finance for live UK prices and have a read on the odd share chat of advfn Google yahoo investing.com to get news etc