If your inbox is filling up with Bulletin Board Alerts, you may just be wondering whether to send them to the spam folder without a second glance, but if you have a nose for investment, pause a moment before discounting them entirely. While it is true Bulletin Board Alerts can be a vehicle for scammers, there are ways to sort the wheat from the chaff. With a little time and common sense, it is possible to find something amongst the multitudes of stocks available that will be beneficial to your portfolio.
Bulletin Board Alerts can come from any number of sources, but how do they differ from everyday stocks?
They are not traded over the major markets such as the NYSE and the NASDAQ. Bulletin Board stocks and their contemporaries—including penny stocks, micro-caps, small caps, and the like—are traded via the Pink Sheets or the OTCBB (Over The Counter Bulletin Boards). These real time manual exchanges are run electronically, and the requirements and rules for trading are much more lenient.
Financial reports, asset bases, debt levels, and shareholder numbers can therefore be difficult to come by via regular means, so it can be hard to tell a good company from an ordinary one. However, if you have an eye for the fluctuating stock market, and a little flair for research, it is not an impossible task to evaluate the particular stocks that have caught your eye.
Make use of the internet and other media to research whatever you cannot find via regular means. Message boards and Bulletin Board Alerts can host a wealth of information, but as they are open to all, much misinformation can find its way via these means of communication. Never take anything you read on a message board or in an unsolicited email as gospel. Always check other sources to verify information. These are available as news items and interviews, television programs, archived items on news websites, and anything else which supplies information about companies standing in the current market.
A good company will have a solid management team, a strong asset base, and a quality product or service. If they are in debt, this can still be acceptable as long as their presence in the market is strong enough to overcome short term financial instability. Watching the markets over time and considering your options carefully when acting on Bulletin Board Alerts can make the difference between rags and riches, so keep a level head, dig deep, and reap the rewards that are there for the taking.
