Where do you get your financial news?

I a believer that unless you have a financial planner who you trust (or a spouse who is good with the finances and investments) you need to keep up to date on financial news. The internet is a great source for financial information, but like everything else on the internet there is so much out there that it can be quite overwhelming. If you have a certain site that you like and you check it regularly then keep doing it. The minor variances between different news sites are not important enough to make a difference in your investment strategy.

The gold standard for financial information has always been, and continues to be, the Wall Street Journal. There was a time that I subscribed to the WSJ and I read each day,s paper cover to cover. After my subscription ran out I made it a point to read the journal in the school library each day. It is very time consuming to read the Journal each day and too expensive to only browse the headlines. I don't see myself subscribing to the Journal again anytime soon (maybe when my 80 hour weeks turn into 40 hour weeks).

It is not imperative to have a daily dose of financial news to be investment savy. Sometimes it is almost counterproductive as the daily reminder of bad news leads many to abandon their investment strategy and sell at the bottom of a market, while a daily reminder of good news encourages investors to increase their investment spending at the market peak. Both of these actions lead to poor returns.

With no time to read the Journal many people turn to the finance section of the local newspaper. That just doesn't do it for me. It is a rare occurrence that I find a worthwhile finance article in a "normal" newspaper.

So what are we left with? A Finance magazine is the way to go. In the past I have subscribed to Money as well as SmartMoney. Recently I decided to subscribe to trial offers from the major finance magazines to decide which is the best for me, and hence the best for everyone else right? I received issues of Smart Money, Money, Forbes, and Fortune. What follows is my analysis of each magazine and my pick for the best.

Fortune - First of all this is a weekly magazine. That's a bad thing. I have the fortitude to read Sport's Illustrated on a weekly basis, but not Forbes. The pendulum like views of the various finance writers is just too much to tackle on a weekly basis. Overall Fortune spends too much time dealing with issues that apply to the upper echelon of wage earners. They recently had a story on how hard Obama's plan will hit the many families in the $200,000+ income tax bracket. Of the 4 families in the story the lowest gross income was $350,000. The story talks about HENRYs (high income earners not rich yet). It's an interesting article, but it is way out of touch with what I want in a financial magazine. The target audience of Fortune is a few tax brackets above most of us.

Forbes - The articles in Forbes are of no use to me. Forbes runs a very good website that I check frequently, but the magazine is just a printed version of that website. The articles deal with things like how to fix the economy and what can be done about trade with China. Sure this is what is in the news, but how is that going to help my bottom line? It's nice to think about what can be done to help the economy recover, but what I need to know now is how I can take advantage of the market today not how to change it tomorrow. Forbes is filled with stories of gloom and doom during the bear market and rainbows and sunshine during when the bull shows up. That's just plain useless.

Smart Money - Smart Money is the monthly magazine put out by the Wall Street Journal. When the magazine first started the editor was Peter Lynch (think Fidelity Magellan during the good years). Back then it was a great magazine. The articles were useful. There were enough different opinions to cover any investment philosophy. In the past few years the editor has changed and the content of the magazine has gone down. There are fewer and fewer investment articles and more and more consumer purchase articles. I don't care what wine is the best buy of the month. If I wanted to know what $60,000+ sports car is the best buy I would subscribe to Car and Driver or even Consumer Reports, but not my monthly Financial.

Money - Far and away the best choice. I love Money. The articles are short and easy to read so I don't have to set aside 30 minutes each time I want to open the cover. A look at the titles of this months stories shows why I like it.
"Four ways to tame your fear of this Market"
"Right on your Money" (analysis of free websites to track saving, spending and investments)
"Kids and Money"
"The Mole" (why you should be buying stocks now)
"What would Warren Do" Any reference to Warren Buffet is a good one.

I think it's clear which way I went with my trial subscriptions. It also didn't hurt that my first year with Money is free (I can't remember where I found that deal), but I would have gladly paid for it.

The next step is how to read a financial magazine, but that is a topic for another post.