Sources of Financial Information

Financial information and data can be gathered from a wide variety of print, electronic, and verbal sources. In this interactivity, you will learn about some of these sources. Click the player button to begin.

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Evaluating Financial Information

Now that you know about the sources of financial information, how do you decide which information is reliable? It's not always possible to believe that one source of financial information is always reliable, so you should ask yourself the following questions when examining a source:

• Does this source have an incentive to sell me a service or a product?
• Has this person or organiation presented statistical data in an appropriate way? Have they tried to use it to show a specific point of view?
• Is the source I'm using an opinion piece or an actual news piece?
• What is the skill set of the person or organization offering me advice?

Even after you evaluate your sources of financial information, it's important to remember that their past performance is no guarantee of future performance. It's up to you to determine the reliability of the information and then make your financial decisions accordingly.