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Learn · Make it click

Choose one idea. Make it make sense.

Start with a useful route, a trading goal or a simple search. Every guide gives you the plain answer first and the technical depth when you want it.

Essential guides

Start here

Six calm starting points. Open the one that matches what you need now.

01Stocks and sharesBegin with ownership, portfolios and the everyday building blocks of investing.6 guides
Investing basics

What is a stock or share?

A share is a small piece of ownership in a company. A stock is the same basic idea, especially in American usage.

beginner · 4 minRead guide
Investing basics

Stocks

Stocks are the asset class made up of tradable company shares. The plural describes many possible ownership interests rather than the single ownership unit explained by a share.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Investing basics

What is a portfolio?

A portfolio is the complete set of investments and cash considered together. Its behaviour depends on each holding's weight and on how the holdings move in relation to one another.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Investing basics

Dividends

A dividend is a distribution a company chooses to make to eligible shareholders, usually from available cash. It transfers value out of the company and is not an extra return created from nothing.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Investing basics

Asset allocation

Asset allocation is the decision about how much of a portfolio belongs in broad exposure groups such as shares, bonds and cash. It sets the portfolio's main sources of risk and return.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Investing basics

Portfolio rebalancing

Rebalancing returns a portfolio towards its intended allocation after market moves or cash flows change the weights. It is a risk-control process, not a promise to improve returns.

intermediate · 3 minRead guide
02Earnings and company resultsUnderstand the result, the expectation and why the share price can react differently.6 guides
Understanding companies

What happens when a company reports earnings?

An earnings report is a regular update on what a listed company sold, earned and expects next.

beginner · 4 minRead guide
Understanding companies

Revenue

Revenue is the amount recognised from selling goods or services before related operating costs are deducted. Recognition rules determine when activity enters the income statement.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Understanding companies

Profit

Profit is what remains after defined revenues and expenses are matched for an accounting period. Different profit measures stop at different layers, so the label needs a definition.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Understanding companies

Earnings per share

Earnings per share, or EPS, allocates a defined profit attributable to ordinary shareholders across a weighted share count. Diluted EPS also reflects specified potential shares.

intermediate · 3 minRead guide
Understanding companies

Company guidance

Company guidance is management's stated expectation or range for future performance under current assumptions. It updates the information set but remains a forecast, not a commitment.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Understanding companies

Analyst estimates

Analyst estimates are forecasts for company measures such as revenue or earnings. A consensus combines selected forecasts, but dispersion and update timing reveal information hidden by the average.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
03OptionsLearn the movement, probability and execution ideas that options build upon.6 guides
Markets & trading

Options basics

An option is a time-limited contract giving its buyer a right, but not an obligation, under defined terms. Calls relate to buying the underlying; puts relate to selling it.

intermediate · 3 minRead guide
Risk & returns

What does volatility actually mean?

Volatility describes how widely and quickly prices move, not whether an investment is good or bad.

beginner · 4 minRead guide
Reading the evidence

Probability

Probability represents uncertainty on a scale from impossible to certain under a defined model or evidence base. It describes possible outcomes, not a hidden guarantee about one event.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Markets & trading

What is the bid/ask spread?

The bid is the best current buying price. The ask is the best current selling price. The gap is the spread.

beginner · 4 minRead guide
Risk & returns

Expected value

Expected value is the probability-weighted average of possible outcomes under a model. It describes the long-run centre of that model, not what must happen next.

intermediate · 3 minRead guide
Markets & trading

Market liquidity

Market liquidity is the ability to trade a useful quantity promptly without moving the price greatly. It depends on size, cost, speed and current market conditions.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
04How Tradour and BSP workSee how directions, strength, outcomes and evidence states fit together.6 guides
Tradour explained

What is a Tradour directional feature?

A Tradour directional feature records how a source labelled an expected move. It is research data, not an instruction to trade.

beginner · 4 minRead guide
Tradour explained

Indicator count

Indicator count records how many source indicators contributed to an observation under the BSP convention. It is a descriptive feature, not a validated confidence score.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Tradour explained

Rise/Drop strength

Rise/Drop strength is a source-provided feature describing the degree attached to a directional label under its own convention. Tradour does not treat it as calibrated probability.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Tradour explained

Historical and prospective evidence

Historical evidence examines outcomes already known to the archive; prospective evidence freezes a record before the outcome exists. The second protects against hindsight in a way replay cannot.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Tradour explained

Displayed and raw direction

Raw direction is the source label before transformation; displayed direction is the label after the documented presentation rule. Tradour keeps both so inversion cannot become hidden interpretation.

intermediate · 3 minRead guide
Tradour explained

Prospective validation

Prospective validation tests a frozen candidate on future qualifying observations recorded before outcomes. It adds evidence without allowing the rule to learn from the answers being scored.

intermediate · 3 minRead guide
05The BSP PlaybookFollow an idea from first pattern to a rule that can face a fair forward test.6 guides
Tradour explained

The Tradour evidence lifecycle

The Tradour evidence lifecycle keeps exploratory, candidate, validated, Playbook and prospective states distinct. Movement requires explicit evidence and review rather than persuasive presentation.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Tradour explained

What does Exploratory mean?

Exploratory means a pattern was observed while questions, cohorts or thresholds were still being examined. It is useful for forming hypotheses but already exposed to selection.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Tradour explained

What is the Tradour Playbook?

The Tradour Playbook is the governed home for findings that meet the required evidence and publication state. Ideas being tested remain clearly separate from established entries.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Tradour explained

What is a canonical outcome?

A canonical outcome is the versioned primary measure Tradour approves for a research question. It fixes timing, calendar, price fields, horizon, direction and edge cases before comparison.

intermediate · 3 minRead guide
Tradour explained

How a finding becomes more credible

A finding becomes more credible as its definition, data, effect, uncertainty, robustness, independence and prospective performance withstand separate checks. No single percentage supplies credibility.

intermediate · 3 minRead guide
Tradour explained

What is a research cohort?

A research cohort is the set of observations that meet a frozen inclusion rule for a question. Its boundary determines which population the result can describe.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
06Risk, returns and market mechanicsMake sense of gains, losses, price movement and how trades actually meet.6 guides
Risk & returns

What does investment risk mean?

Investment risk is the possibility that outcomes differ from what is needed or expected, including permanent loss, shortfall, illiquidity and uncomfortable variation. No single number captures every form.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Risk & returns

Investment returns

Investment return is the change in value over a period, including relevant income and costs under a stated convention. The period, cash flows and currency determine the calculation.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Risk & returns

What does volatility actually mean?

Volatility describes how widely and quickly prices move, not whether an investment is good or bad.

beginner · 4 minRead guide
Risk & returns

What is diversification?

Diversification spreads exposure so that one company, sector or risk does not decide the whole result.

beginner · 4 minRead guide
Risk & returns

Drawdowns

A drawdown is the decline from a previous peak to a later value before a new peak is reached. It describes experienced loss from the high-water mark, not return from the original start.

beginner · 3 minRead guide
Markets & trading

Market liquidity

Market liquidity is the ability to trade a useful quantity promptly without moving the price greatly. It depends on size, cost, speed and current market conditions.

beginner · 3 minRead guide

What do I need to know to trade…?

Follow a practical learning path

Each path begins with six carefully ordered foundations, then opens the full route.

Earnings

What should I know to trade earnings?

The reporting clock, expectations, surprises and why a market reaction is relative rather than absolute.

  1. What happens when a company reports earnings?
  2. Revenue
  3. Profit
  4. Earnings per share
  5. Company guidance
  6. Analyst estimates
Open the pathway
Options

What should I know to trade options?

Volatility, probability, leverage and execution foundations before the option contract itself.

  1. What is the bid/ask spread?
  2. Market orders
  3. Limit orders
  4. Market liquidity
  5. Options basics
  6. What does volatility actually mean?
Open the pathway
Foreign exchange

What should I know to trade FX?

Two-sided prices, exchange-rate risk and the economic forces that can change one currency against another.

  1. What is the bid/ask spread?
  2. Currency risk
  3. Inflation
  4. Interest rates
  5. Central banks
  6. Economic growth
Open the pathway
Value

What should I know to explore value investing?

Price, business quality, cash generation and the reasons a low-looking valuation may be deserved.

  1. What is a P/E ratio?
  2. What does valuation mean?
  3. Book value
  4. Price-to-book ratio
  5. Free cash flow
  6. Company debt
Open the pathway
Growth

What should I know to explore growth investing?

Revenue, margins, expectations and valuation before treating a fast-growing business as a good investment.

  1. Revenue
  2. Profit margins
  3. Earnings per share
  4. What does valuation mean?
  5. Company guidance
  6. Analyst estimates
Open the pathway
Commodities

What should I know to trade commodities?

The asset, contract, economic forces and risk mechanics behind commodity markets.

  1. Futures basics
  2. What does volatility actually mean?
  3. Leverage
  4. Position sizing
  5. Inflation
  6. Interest rates
Open the pathway

Deeper understanding

Build the ideas around the thing you came for.

These connected collections fill in the company, market, risk, evidence and economic context that turns one definition into practical understanding.

Investing basicsThe building blocks of owning, saving and investing.26 guidesUnderstanding companiesHow businesses make money and how investors describe them.30 guidesMarkets & tradingWhat happens when prices move and trades meet in a market.32 guidesRisk & returnsHow gains, losses and uncertainty fit together.24 guidesReading the evidencePlain-English statistics for judging patterns and claims.38 guidesTradour explainedThe language and safeguards used in Tradour research.20 guidesEconomy & contextThe wider forces that appear in market news and analysis.24 guides

Complete library

Browse all guides without the overwhelm

Search ordinary words or technical terms, then narrow the library by category or level. The seven families stay folded until you choose one.

194 guides
Investing basicsThe building blocks of owning, saving and investing.26 guides
Understanding companiesHow businesses make money and how investors describe them.30 guides
Markets & tradingWhat happens when prices move and trades meet in a market.32 guides
Risk & returnsHow gains, losses and uncertainty fit together.24 guides
Reading the evidencePlain-English statistics for judging patterns and claims.38 guides
Tradour explainedThe language and safeguards used in Tradour research.20 guides
Economy & contextThe wider forces that appear in market news and analysis.24 guides