Useful Finance and Accounting
Websites
This is a list of finance and accounting websites that we have found
useful. It is not an exhaustive list. If you find others that should be
on it, have a suggestion for improvement, or just want to let me know you were here, please e-mail Dr. Michael
Kinsman.
Go to information on:
Interesting finance data sources
Using your financial calculator. You have a new financial
calculator, and you'd like to learn to use it for finance calculations. Try this page, which includes a printable one-page exp
lanation of "how to" for your new calculator.
NEW! Amortize your loan. This is a
great loan amortization tool. Put in the relevant data--loan amount, interest rate, loan length and how often you pay (from weekly
to annually) as well as the date your loan starts. The calculator provides you payment, interest, principal and balance for each
payment, and annual interest and principal paid. It's a very nice piece of work, and free!
SUPERSPOT! The Money Alert. This is a well set up website that provides a raft of
information about markets, personal finances, financial planning, retirement planning, and other financial subject.
It is an easy read, with pointers to subjects that all of us will find interesting.
SUPERSPOT! Financial Planning Resource Guide.
This site was recommended by one of the readers who found this site useful--it is one she often uses for other financial planning data. I have looked at the
resources, and they are excellent, particularly for the turbulent times we find ourselves in now. This site is very worth a look.
Special use on-line financial calculators. Are you interested in how much
you can afford to pay for a house, how much insurance you should have, or how you should finance that car? This site has some
really clever on-line financial calculators to help you decide.
Annuity FYI. This website contains a raft of information
about Annuities. Annuities are not for everyone--very often, their fees are relatively high and they offer less flexibility
than some other investments. However, in the right situation, they can be appropriate vehicles for an investor, particularly
one who is risk averse. In addition, this website offers a great number of retirement planning referrals--sites that may be
useful as you consider putting away the money that will get you that spot in retirement paradise.
Loan Calculator. This is another of the growing number of calculator
websites. The calculators seem comprehensive and well done, with a good interface.
Global Association of Risk
Management website is devoted to risk management, with many intersting links and a lot of information for the investor
and the academic.
Site map to the Quicken Financial data sources page
From investments and home refinancing to insurance and tax planning, this site points you to a lot of good information.
I have put this near the top of the list because of the comprehensive nature of what you will find here.
SUPERSPOT! Wachowicz's
Web World (WEB sites for discerning finance students). The author of this site is also the co-author of a widely used
finance textbook. He has put together an excellent site which includes auxiliary class materials, references to outside readings
for chapters of his or any other finance text, and references to websites that finance students will find of use.
SUPERSPOT! Academicinfo. This site contains a huge amount
of information egarding degrees in business; journals in business; databases; and other useful information, all collected in one easy-to-use site.
VentureLine--where everybody has an MBA
This site is intended to provide tools to MBA's and non-MBA's alike to help make financial decisions. At this time, much of the
material is in beta test, which is probably a good time to try the tools for free!
NEW! Business Degrees and Online Subject Guide
Don't let the title fool you. This site supplies a great list of online information--journals, research tools and data bases,
and a raft of other materials that are useful, well collected and well cited. This site is worth a look (thanks to Michelle for
pointing it out!)
Data on the economy
HSH Associates Adjustable Rate Mortgage Indices. So you have an adjustable rate mortgage, and you aren't sure the financial
institution has changed your rates correctly. This site show ARM indices to as early as 1975. They are downloadable. In
addition, if you are shopping for a home loan, this site can give you an idea of where to look at what to expect to pay.
HSH Associates Lender's showcase.
Shopping for a new home loan? Want to refinance? HSH has a by-state list of lenders who quote rates
and points. A great starting point for getting information. Since HSH is in the business of
providing information, and not providing the loan, this is a great site.
Internet Bankruptcy Library All kinds of information on bankruptcy, including
troubled securities and legal information.
Financial
data finder. A huge file of information on sources of data published
by Ohio State University.
Finance:
The world-wide web virtual library. Another compendium of information
sources provided by Ohio State University. This is organized by "who
you are."
Finance/Economics links for journals,
working papers, databases, etc. An index of still more finance and
economics sources on the web. Interested in the location of a journal?
It's here. Interested in working papers? Interested in still more financial
data sources? All are here.
FRED: The Federal Reserve Electronic
Data Downloadable data on the economy and interest rates provided by the
Federal Reserve of St. Louis. Prime rates from 1949 to the present by month; lots
of other downloadable interest rate data, and lots of other data on the economy.
Really worth a look if you need historical data or information on the economy.
SEC filings (EDGAR). The
SEC's project EDGAR is a current set of SEC filings.
U.S. Department of Labor
Data. Data on labor trends, price indices and other things that may
drive other financial data. This is a place to get data before it gets
to your newpaper, while there may still be time to act on it to
make money.
Stock and bond market data sources
Bonds Online. Named one of the Smart Money 10 most valuable
finance sites on the web, this site contains a huge amount of data on bonds--savings bonds, treasuries, corporate bonds,
municipal bonds--including prices and research. If you are interested in fixed income securities, this is a good spot to go.
ChartFilter I am not a believer in charting or technical analysis.
However, many are, and this website offers good education for those interested in this subject.
Hoover's
MasterList Plus Database. This is a super starting point for gathering
stock information on over 9,600 companies. You can get quotes, information
on SEC filings, company information, and more. An excellent site.
Investment resources. This site, sponsored by Infomanage, Inc.,
has more pointers to financial data than you can imagine. It includes all stock markets on the web, pointers
to electronic newspapers and magazines, currency rates internationally,
international stock market information, pointers to information about stocks,
bonds and government bonds, and just about anything else you can want.
Investopedia As described by its webmaster, Investopedia is your complete,
unbiased and easy to understand educational guide to investing and personal finance. The site includes the most comprehensive
investing dictionary on the web as well as hundreds of financial tutorials and articles. A very nice site worth the time of
any investor, particularly a serious student of investing.
J.P. Morgan Investment Bankers. This site, sponsored by JP Morgan & Co., has a huge
amount of information on financial instruments. Better than the average brokerage site--this is well organized and seemingly
very complete.
Merrill Lynch data page. Merrill Lynch is the largest stock broker in the United States. On these
pages, they provide data that may help you in making stock selections.
These pages also provide information on the broader investment market and
on the economy. No endorsement of Merrill Lynch is offered or intended
by including this reference.
The NASDAQ home page. NASDAQ,
the stock market for the rest of us, has a homepage that provides a great
deal of information on the smaller companies traded on NASDAQ. This is
an interesting site.
Prudential Securities website. This is a fairly good stock site, with the
usual materials one would expect from a broker.
NEW! Stock Market Yellow Pages. This is a really
clever search engine. You type in what you want in a stock [for example, Large Pharmaceutical genetics] and it will bring up a list of
stocks meeting those criteria from Yahoo.com (the default) or 19 (on August 1, 2003) other sources. For the other sources,
choose your company and then click on the source below it. This is useful for refining that search and for getting information from a
variety of sources for that special situation.
NEW! Stock Maven. Stock research center, real time quotes and
news, live financial markets data, research tools to evaluate and track stocks of publicly held companies.
Free real time streaming ECN quotes software.
TaxFreeBond.com.
Interested in tax free bonds as an investment? This site talks about the advantages, offers trading in such bonds,
and offers hard to find quotes on municipal bonds.
Yahoo's finance page. Yahoo provides information here on stocks, including very
current news; stock quotes; and pointers to lots of useful and interesting sites. A good place to go.
Information on commodities
Chicago Mercantile Exchange. The new name of
the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and the Chicago Board of Trade is...CME Group.
This site offers updates on commodities trading on a 10 minute basis. This is your chance to make
a bundle. Information on agricultural, currency, equity, and interest futures.
The old saying in commodities is, "I've made 5 fortunes in commodities...and
lost 6."
Information on trading partnership interests
The Valuations Group Interested in buying an evaluation of the market value of
your partnership (perhaps for sale, estate value, gift value or just general interest)? The Valuations Group will sell one to you.
Finance magazines and papers
Fortune
Magazine. Fortune Magazine's home page, including stories from the
current issue.
Finance India This Journal has an impressive
board of editors, and will provide good information for academics
in finance. Probably not the cup of tea of non-academics.
Money
Magazine electronic version. This is a very nice summary of some things
Money Magazine has to say on a daily basis. You can also request an e-mail
version daily, including closing stock prices and other financial information.
Accounting data sources
California Society of CPA's. A
good website by a professional organization of CPAs in California. Probably
most useful to a CSCPA member or a student interested in becoming a CPA.
California oriented material.
Dr. Dennis R. Schmidt's
accounting website. An absolutely amazing array of pointers to other
accounting and tax websites, information of use to the accountant, accounting teacher,
accounting student, or business person interested in accounting. Dr. Schmidt
has pointers to accounting course information; jobs in accounting; accounting
firms in the US; non-US accounting; and many others. This site is a must
see and is probably the best jumping off point for an accounting search.
It may end up being all you need.
IRS
tax forms in PDF. It's 11 o'clock at night, and you need just one more
form to finish a tax return. Where do you get it? If you have
Adobe
Acrobat Reader (available online), you can download a PDF version that
you can print and use. Almost any IRS form you could want is here, and
the quality is actually higher on our laser printer than the IRS forms
we get from the service center.
Misleading Accounting Exposed.
This is a fun and instructive site. In it, Mike Staskiewicz has pulled together a lot of
information on accounting that is "legal" but just not right. It includes links to articles that discuss legal, but misleading, accounting distortions of reported earnings and distortions of other financial statement items.
7 crazy taxes from the US and Abroad.
This is a fun site suggested by Ms. Fiato's class (hope they had a great Pizza party on Friday).
Seven taxes that, on the surface, may seem outlandish (aren't all taxes you are subject to
outlandish!). The first one, though, follows all other state laws pretty well--people get taxed
on the place where they work, and a pro athlete generally will be taxed on where he (or she) makes his (or her) money--
on the field of competition. All of these are fun examples of taxes.
Pricewaterhouse Coopers This well organized site is not a commercial for PWC. It is instead an information packed resource on industries, accounting, and more. Very worth looking at, and well organized.
Tax information site. Are you interested in US tax rates, pointers to tax sites, or late breaking (sometimes a month old, but still useful) tax data? This may be your site.
Tax sites
on the Web. This list contains a huge number of references to tax related
subjects. The webmaster says his goal is to have every tax related site
on the web mentioned in his huge number of lists, and based on my scan,
he's pretty close to his goal. Non-US taxes, US taxes, tax research, tax
software. If it has to do with taxes (well, except how to pay for them)
it's probably in this site. A truly phenomenal job. Try the framed Netscape
version if you have that capability.
World wide tax information. This site
contains a wealth of information on taxes and tax rates world wide. It also includes a mini-course in
double entry bookkeeping. When this site comes to full power, it could be the godzilla of
world wide tax sites.
Leave this page. Go to:
Last updated 12/19/09 by MKinsman@pepperdine.edu