How do I interpret this analysis from Second Opinion?
"In Second Opinion's opinion, they say ""Do not initiate new position.""  This means do not buy the stock if you do not already own it.   Since they also say to hold if you do own it, this is a very ""who knows what it will do"" neutral position (IMO)." "This is analyst speak for ""the stock isn't going anywhere anytime soon"". Remember these guys are offering advice to the entire universe in a few lines, so the advice gets fortune cookie-like. When I look at these things, I care more about when the analyst changes their opinion more than what the opinion is. If you really trust this person, you should listen to the earnings call for the stock (or read the transcript) and listen for the questions asked by the analyst. Usually you'll be able to understand why the analyst feels the way he does." No, you shouldn't buy it. The advice here is to keep any existing holdings but not make new purchases of the stock.
"This chart concerns an option contract, not a stock. The method of analysis is to assume that the price of an option contract is normally distributed around some mean which is presumably the current price of the underlying asset. As the date of expiration of the contract gets closer the variation around the mean in the possible end price for the contract will decrease. Undoubtedly the publisher has measured typical deviations from the mean as a function of time until expiration from historical data. Based on this data, the program that computes the probability has the following inputs: (1) the mean (current asset price) (2) the time until expiration (3) the expected standard deviation based on (2) With this information the probability distribution that you see is generated (the green hump). This is a ""normal"" or Gaussian distribution. For a normal distribution the probability of a particular event is equal to the area under the curve to the right of the value line (in the example above the value chosen is 122.49). This area can be computed with the formula:  This formula is called the probability density for x, where x is the value (122.49 in the example above). Tau (T) is the reciprocal of the variance (which can be computed from the standard deviation). Mu (μ) is the mean. The main assumption such a calculation makes is that the price of the asset will not change between now and the time of expiration. Obviously that is not true in most cases because the prices of stocks and bonds constantly fluctuate. A secondary assumption is that the distribution of the option price around the mean will a normal (or Gaussian) distribution. This is obviously a crude assumption and common sense would suggest it is not the most accurate distribution. In fact, various studies have shown that the Burr Distribution is actually a more accurate model for the distribution of option contract prices." The Level 2 data is simply showing the depth of the market. If I am trading shares with my broker I have the option of viewing only the top 10 bid/ask prices in the depth or all of the data (which sometimes can be a very long list). With another broker I get the top ten bid and ask prices and how many orders are available for each price level, or I have the option of listing each order separately for each price level (in order of when the order was placed). I get the same kind of data if trading options. I do not know about futures because I don't trade them. Simply this data may be important to a trader because it may give an indication of whether there are more buyers or sellers in the market, which in turn may (but not always) give an indication of which way the market may be moving. As an example the price depth below shows WBC before market open with sellers outweighing the buyers in both numbers and volume.  This gives an indication that prices may drop when the market opens. Of course there could be some good news coming out prior to market open or just after, causing a flood of buyers into the market and sellers to cancel their orders. This would change everything around with more buyers than sellers and indicate that prices may now be going up. The market depth is an important aspect to look at before putting an order in, as it can give an indication of which way the market is moving, especially in a very liquid security or market. It looks like the advice the rep is giving is based primarily on the sunk cost fallacy; advice based on a fallacy is poor advice. Bob has recognised this trap and is explicitly avoiding it. It is possible that the advice that the rep is trying to give is that Fund #1 is presently undervalued but, if so, that is a good investment irrespective if Bob has lost money there before or even if he has ever had funds in it. I, too, was not a fan of ARCH or some of the other statistical items. I went through to memorize some of the method names like Durbin-Watson and knew what they corrected or what they used for. I think I had 3 of them. That was the extent of my studying for that section. A complete analysis of your current situation, goals, and formulating a plan to meet those goals, including discussing your risk tolerance cannot be completed during the initial meeting. The first meeting should be him trying to convince you of his skills and services, he will also be collecting the required data from you.  You could inquire a few days before the meeting what information he needs from you. The less he asks for the less though the analysis at the initial meeting. This would also be a good time to ask about fee structure. Some planners make money on the initial plan, others make money on the execution of the plan. What fee that is expected for the initial analysis can vary greatly. You should ask, but most will consider this first meeting as the cost of doing business. TL;DR for those who don't want to waste their time: Uber didn't do anything special. Also, you should follow unethical laws and not try to change or challenge the system.  While I was reading the piece I thought it was the work of a sophomore, but it turns out this was written by a professor. "I *think*... the topic of the essay states: ""Provide a thorough discussion if the meaning  and interpretation of the four descriptive statistical measures required in your analysis: Arirthmetic mean, Variance, Standard Deviation, and coefficeint of variation. for example, how are these measures related to each other?""  I have no idea what I'm doing. I'll buy you reddit gold for a year if you help me out." I don't think you can always assume a 12-month time horizon.  Sometimes, the analyst's comments might provide some color on what kind of a time horizon they're thinking of, but it might be quite vague. What you found is that when your were on website X on day y when you clicked on the link they told you to buy 7 stocks and you performed an experiment, but the values went down. Somebody else on website A on day B saw a lightly different list, they may have been flat. But if you were on website W on day D that list hit the jackpot. Which of the three decided that the people running the ad knew what they were talking about? They could have tailored the list based on the nature of the website. Sports and recreation ones on ESPN, high tech on a computer focus site. They could have varied the size of the lit, they could have varied the way they described their analysis. They could have even varied the name of the expert to make it sound familiar or authoritative.  What you found was a marketing plan. It may have been a scam, or it may have been just a way to try and convince you they know what they were doing. If you clicked on the wrong list, they probably lost you as a potential customer, unless you can convince yourself that they were close, and deserve a second look.... From every article I've encountered, the chicken and egg aspect suggests that IV is produced by looking at options pricing, and calculating the IV from that.  The implication is that whatever is known at that time is included in the price. And that when you see a particular option trade an unusual number of contracts at a given price, the implication is that someone thinks they know something that's not already priced in, i.e. that the current price is not accurate, they can profit on the future event. "IMO, what it seems like you've done is nothing more than having screened out a company worth further investigation. The next step would be a thorough analysis of the company's past financials and current statements to arrive at your own opinion / forecast of the immediate and far future of the company's prospects.  Typically, this is done by looking at the company's regulatory filings, and maybe some additional searching on comparison businesses.  There are many sources of instruction for how one might ""value"" or ""analyze"" a company, or that provide help on ""reading a balance sheet"".  (This is not an easy skill to learn, but it is one that will prove invaluable over a lifetime of investing.) It is possible that you'll uncover a deteriorating business where the latest selling, and subsequent drop in price that caused the high yield, is well-deserved.  In which case, you know to stay away and move on to the next idea. On the other hand, you might end up confident that the company is not suffering from a drop in sales, rise in expenses, growing debt payments, loss of ""moat"", etc.  In which case, you've found a great investment candidate.  I say candidate because you still may decide this company isn't for you, even if the financials are right, because you might find better opportunities for an equal, or acceptable, return at lower risk while you're researching. As to the yield being high when there are no problems with the fundamentals of the business, this may simply be because of panic selling during this past few week's downturn, or some other sort of temporary and superficial scare.  However, be warned that the masses can remain irrational, and thus the price stay suppressed or even drop further, for longer than you're willing to wait for your ROI.  The good news is that in that case, you're being well compensated to wait at a 11+% yield!" Based upon what little is publicly known at this time, it doesn't look good for CAT, PWC or outside counsel. The economic substance they offered up sounds like *post hoc* reasoning. The tax court buying their current explanations would have to accept some exceptionally astute, long-range planning took place that accepted the initial costs exceeding the nascent parts revenue, as well as the risks of over-optimizing tax operations if the necessary revenue didn't materialize; and it doesn't seem they are yet offering any evidence to show that kind of foresight. It will be fascinating to follow, for sure. The short answer: it depends. The long answer.. Off the top of my head, there are quite a number of factors that an analyst may look at when analyzing a stock, to come up with a recommendation.  Some example factors to look at include: The list goes on.  Quite literally, any and all factors are fair game for a recommendation.  So, the question isn't really what analysts do with financial data, it is what do analysts do with financial data that meets your investment needs? As an example, if you have two analysts, one who is focused on growth stocks, and one who is focused on dividend growth, they may have completely different views on a company.  If both analysts were to analyze Apple (AAPL) 5 years ago, the dividend analyst would likely say SELL or at the most HOLD, because back then Apple did not have a dividend.  However, an analyst focused on growth would likely have said BUY, because Apple appeared to be on a clear upward trend in terms of growth.  Likewise, if you have analysts who are focused on shorting stocks, and ones who are focused on deep value investing, the sell analyst may be selling SELL because they are confident the stock will go down in price, so you can make money on the short position.  Conversely, the deep value investor may be saying BUY, because they believe that based on the companies strong balance sheet, and recent shake-ups in management the stock will eventually turn around.  Two completely different views for the same company: the analyst focused on shorting is looking to make money by capitalizing on falling share price, while the analyst focused on deep value is looking for unloved companies in a tailspin whom s/he believe will turn around, the thesis being that if you dollar-cost-average as the price drops, when it corrects, you'll reap the rewards. That all said, to answer the question about what analysts look for: So really, you should be looking for analysts who align with your investment style, and use those recommendations as a starting point for your own purchases.  Personally, I am a dividend investor, so I have passed many BUY recommendations from analysts and my former broker because those were based on growth stories.  That does not mean that the analysts, my former broker, or myself, are wrong.  But we were all incorrect given the context of how I invest, and what they recommend. "This company was a reputable rating agency for many years. See Weiss Research website, ratings section for a very different perspective on Martin Weiss's work than the websites with which he is now associated. I checked both links provided, and agree with the questioner in every way: These appear to be highly questionable investment research websites. I use such strong terms based on the fact that the website actually uses the distasteful pop-up ploy,  ""Are you SURE you want to leave this site?"" Clearly, something changed between what Weiss Ratings was in the past (per company history since 1971) and what Martin Weiss is doing now. Larry Edelson seems to have been associated exclusively with questionable websites and high pressure investment advice since 2007. From 1996 through the present, he worked as either an employee or contractor of Weiss Research. Let's answer each of your questions.  On June 22, 2006, the Commission instituted settled administrative   proceedings against Weiss Research, Inc., Martin Weiss, and Lawrence   Edelson (collectively, “Respondents”) for violations of the Investment   Advisers Act of 1940 in connection with their operation of an   unregistered investment adviser and the production and distribution of   materially false and misleading marketing materials. Full details about Weiss Ratings operations, including its history from 1996 through 2001, when it operated in compliance with securities laws, then from 2001 through 2005, which was when the SEC filed charges for regulatory violations, are available from the June 2006 U.S. SEC court documents PDF. Finally, this quantitative assessment, ""Safe With Martin Weiss? (December 2010) by CXO Advisory (providers of ""objective research and reviews to aid investing decisions"") for its readers concluded the following: In summary, the performance of Martin Weiss’ premium services in   aggregate over the past year is unimpressive. The study methodology was good, but I recommend reading the article (I posted the URL) to fully understand what caveats and assumptions were done to reach that conclusion." I'm not sure that you're considering all the options.   So you may not subtract $X from B, but you do compare NPV(B) to $Y.   Also, remember that we're not trying to figure out the return on B.  We're trying to figure out what to do next.  In terms of planning, the sunk cost is irrelevant.  But in terms of calculating return, A was a turkey.  And to calculate the return, we would include $X in our costs for B.  And for the second option, we'd subtract $X from $Y (may be negative).   Sunk costs are irrelevant to planning, but they are very relevant to retrospective analysis.  Please don't confuse the two.  When looking back, part of the cost for B will be that $X.  But in the middle, after paying $X and before starting B, the $X is gone.  You only have the building and have to make your decision based on the options you have at that moment.   You will sometimes hear $Y called the opportunity cost of B.  You could sell out for $Y or you could do B.  You should only do B if it is worth more than $Y.   The sunk cost fallacy would be comparing B to $X.  Assuming $Y is less than $X, this would make you not do B when it is your best path forward from that moment.  I.e. $Y < NPV(B) < $X means that you should do the project.  You will lose money (apparently that's a foregone conclusion), but you will lose less money than if you just sold out.   You should also do B if $Y < $X < NPV(B) or $X < $Y < NPV(B).  In general, you should do B any time $Y < NPV(B).  The only time you should not do B is if NPV(B) < $Y.  If they are exactly equal, then it doesn't matter financially whether you do B or not.