Three simple steps to use fourstocks:

• Register - it's a simple form.


• Make picks. You need a minimum of four active picks to be an active member in FourStocks.


• Use the community to help yourself to better stock ideas.

How does FourStocks work in the background?

• Members rate stocks: Members make predictions if a stock will outperform (Buy pick) or underperform (Sell pick) the NIFTY. Members are individuals like you OR Dalal street brokers & investment banks OR the friendly face you see on television who makes stock picks. At FourStocks, we track all "Professionals" and record their picks so you can track their strategies and follow the better performing ones.


• Members score points: The picks members make are scored. The score for each pick is the % outperformance over the NIFTY of that stock (underperformance if it is a short pick). The cumulative sum of all pick points is attributed to the FourStocks Member.


• Members are rated: Members are rated based on their overall score and their accuracy (on a scale of 1 to 100, 100 being the best score)


• Stocks receive FourStocks Ratings: A stock receives a rating based on the number and quality of Members who have picked that stock. Good Members have greater influence on a stock's ratings. So, if you consistently are rated in the 90+ rating category, your picks are more likely to influence a stock's rating than the prime-time astrologer who also makes stock picks.


• Members use the community for better investment ideas: As a result of this meritocracy and multiple other features (Recommending blogs & comments, Family of stocks etc), Members can now milk FourStocks to get better investment ideas from the smartest investors in the community.

The FourStocks community is founded on a strong belief in transparency and in putting one's money where one's mouth is.
This emphasis on transparency and testing one's ideas in the form of concrete picks, helps investors get over some of the more self-destructive biases exhibited by humans (and monkeys!) on equity markets.

• Confirmation bias ("You see, markets tanked last 3 Wednesdays! If only you had listened to the discourses I have been giving for the last 30 years on my Wednesday theory")


• Self-serving bias ("I doubled my money last year due to my incredible talent, but lost most of it this year due to bad luck")


• Hindsight bias ("See, I told you oil you would fall below 100, the sensex would fall to 12,000 and all these investment banks would be out of business soon! Dude, can you lend me 50k?")

This community does not care for big names and reputations. There is no shortage of snake-oil salesmen masquerading as analysts and experts in the mass media and even on the street. The only way our community will stand up and take note is if a member has a consistently good rating based on his/her picks. As brutal as that may sound, it is the FourStocks way. Remember: Words are cheap. Next time you hear the usual prophets making pompous claims on the cocktail circuits, tell them to register on FourStocks. Trust us for one thing: If any of them actually turns out to be The One, we will acknowledge (and maybe, publicize) it.

How do I make a long or short pick?

• Search for the stock: Search for the stock you are looking for by using the SEARCH FORM on the top right corner of every screen. You can search by Ticker or by Company Name


• Go to the stock's page: Click on the link for your stock and go to its main page..


• Make a pick: Make a pick using the form provided on this page. You will be prompted to login if you are not logged in.


• OR use QUICK-START: If you are a complete novice into stock markets, then use the QUICK-START feature.

It does not matter whether you have been on the markets for 2 decades or you're still in school or you are planning for your retirement or you have no idea how the stock market works. There is something in it for everyone.
As a beginner, this is the perfect place for you to start reading about how expert investors (the ones with good Ratings) think and analyze stocks. If you are an expert, this is the place to test your theories and use the community to get better investment ideas.
Whatever your level of expertise, FourStocks cuts out the noise usually associated with markets in the mass media and helps you focus on your real objectives.

Pick points = (Stock Returns - Index Returns) * 100

For an active long pick:
Stock Returns = (Current Stock price - Pick start stock price + Value of dividends) / (Pick start stock price)
Index points = (Current Index level - Pick start index level) / (Pick start index level)

Pick start stock price and Pick start index level are stock and index levels at the time you made the pick.

For a short pick, both the above formulas for Stock points and Index points are multiplied by -1.

For an inactive (closed) pick, the stock and index levels at the time of closing out the pick are used instead of current levels.

A Member gets a rating based on his/her score (sum of all pick points) and accuracy.

FourStocks works on a 15-25 minutes delayed price mechanism. When a user makes a pick, FourStocks picks up the next price at which the stock and the NIFTY trade as the starting levels for the pick. However, since FourStocks works on a delayed price mechanism, this pick remains a "pending pick" for the next 15-25 minutes as the case may be.

Example: You make a pick at 10:30am on a working day. The stock trades next on the market at 10:33am. Then the pick will remain a pending pick till FourStocks picks up this traded level, i.e, anytime between 10:48am and 10:58am.

If all this sounds like rocket science, then don't worry... even we had problems figuring this out initially. But rest assured, you will get the right starting prices for your picks.

The basic principle is: If a highly rated member goes long (or short) a stock then this action will affect the rating of a stock more than when a lowly rated member goes long (or short) the stock.

This way, we make sure that the community opinion is biased towards the wise elders who are raking in points by making the correct calls.

The actual formula for how we do this is a burdensome secret that only the founding members of the priory share.

A "Professional" Member is a public figure or organization (TV personality, brokerage or investment bank) whose picks we, at FourStocks, track. By doing this exercise, we bring in transparency into the whole equity research business as you can see for yourself the points and accuracy of each broker/bank.

A comment is a piece you write when you make a pick explaining your reasons for making this call. While it is not mandatory, it forms a very good repository of views that other members can read, compare and recommend.

You can have only one active pick of a stock at any point in time. You can start and end picks as many times as you want.

A family of stocks is a collection of stocks based on a theme - like sector, size, management style, geography etc. As a Member, you can recommend new families and add stocks to those families. That way the community can track multiple strategies and compare their performance as time goes by.

The Horizon is merely a pointer to the member's expectation on a stock. Your pick will remain active after the time horizon expires. However, longer horizon picks have a greater bearing on a stock's rating.

You are absolutely right. Investment in any asset is made of 2 essential components - picking the right asset and pushing the right amounts of capital at each asset. FourStocks primarily deals with the first issue - selecting the right stocks. We believe that each investor will allocate capital among assets differently based on their utility and hence do not want to make this a portfolio management exercise.

Maybe, just maybe, we might introduce "weights" like (Low conviction, Medium conviction and High conviction) later on.