The most important stock 101 rule that any investing analyst, planner or teacher could teach you is:  DO YOUR STOCK 101 HOMEWORK!  In order to be a successful beginner stock investor, everything starts and ends with your stock 101 homework.  You can’t just go blindly into a company without the appropriate stock knowledge.  Doing that wouldn’t make any sense.  This might be a simple idea, but if you want to be a successful beginner stock investor, there is no way getting passed it.

If you have kids, you know about the homework they have to do and the countless hours they are wasting.  Obviously, you can’t tell them that because you want them to learn the variety of subjects out there so they can find the career that most interests them.  But we can all relate that we’ve wasted so many hours throughout our childhood in subjects from math to history.  And that relation can affect how you feel about stock 101 homework. Don’t let your feelings obstruct you from doing your stock 101 homework! Obtaining the right stock knowledge is vital in your investing success.

For those who still don’t believe in stock 101 homework, you’re probably thinking a couple of things that that convinces you to your contradiction:
1) “If I buy and hold a stock long enough, it’ll come back up.”
2) “I don’t have the time to be that diligent.”

The first thought is completely false.  You can’t count on every stock to rise when it’s supposed to rise just like you can’t predict every stock to fall when it’s suppose to fall.  If your stock knowledge reflects this statement, stop.  Every stock 101 guide’s first rule is to do your stock homework before buying or selling any equity.

The second statement, if true to you, is something you might need to ponder over for a while.  The one thing you need when investing in the stock market is time.  You can’t be a successful beginner stock investor without time.  Jim Cramer, a great and famous financial analyst and stock 101 teacher says that every beginner stock investor should do at minimum one hour of stock homework per stock held in your portfolio.  And that number only increases if you want to make sure you absorb quality stock knowledge. 

Don’t be careless.  You won’t win by buying stocks without the appropriate stock knowledge learned.  Hey, if you don’t have the time, there is no use in trying to take care of your own finances.  You’ll end up losing all your money.  Every beginner stock investor needs to know this because it’s important to understand how time consuming investing can be and how harmful it can be if you don’t have the time to obtain the right stock knowledge.  If you’re a beginner stock investor, examine yourself and make sure that you can handle the hours involved gaining stock knowledge in order to be a solid stock investor. 

If you found this stock 101 rule helpful and wish to learn more about beginner stock investing, please visit my website.  You’ll find valuable stock knowledge on my website including stock investing rules and tips that I’ve learned from my 20 years in the stock market.  Click here for stock 101.