Which Market Sector to Specialize in???
Here's a little background: My future goals include:
-becoming a financial analyst
-get CFA
-get into equity research
I am still young and I do would like to specialize more in a particular field. It doesn't matter what field- i'm looking for a sector that it easy and not complex. A sector or industry that is easy to become an expert at. I want to be proficient at comparing different companies in a certain industry. For example: Biotech/pharmaceuticals sound difficult to understand the industry VS General Electric which I suppose would be much less complex to understand.
Here are my choices:
(thank you google finance)
-Basic Materials
-Basic Goods
-Conglomerates
-Cons. Cylical
-Cons. Non-Cylical
-Energy
-Financial
-Healthcare
-Services
-Technology
-Transportation
-Utilities
Right now i am leaning towards studying financials. I like learning about how banking functions & banking history. But I fear that all those financials, court cases, loans, eurozone, ect, might make the financial sector seem difficult and more complex to understand and predict. I am not an accountant and I do not fully understand a companies financial statement entirely. I enjoy studying banking but right now I really just need a simple sector to understand. What is the easiest sector to understand? What sector do most 1st year analysts cover? Advice is appreciated and I hope it influences what I will start studying.






If you want something easy to
If you want something easy to understand, look at consumer products - you're familiar with some of the names and the analysis will make more sense to you as a result.
financials might be the
financials might be the hardest of the bunch. in this economy, banks are incredibly volatile and tough to master.
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GE is in no way simpler than
GE is in no way simpler than biotech, in biotech/pharma you're trying to value pipelines, GE is finance/industrial. The best thing is to figure out what interests you and to go for that.
healthcare is difficult to
healthcare is difficult to get into for the following reasons: 3rd party payors, regulatory influence, market demand and pricing not determined by basic economic theory of supply vs demand, and some other items.
If you want a simple industry to focus on i say focus on CPG or advertising, those are 2 very easy industries to understand and hence the most populated.
Financials are far and away
Financials are far and away the most difficult to analyze, being as more than 17x (on average) of their assets are OBS. It's not to say they're impossible to analyze, I just don't believe you will ever have anywhere near as good a grasp on a bank as you would a telecom or communications company. Like SEC said--if it's something tangible and familiar to you, it will make more sense.
I was taught that the human brain was the crowning glory of evolution so far, but I think it's a very poor scheme for survival.
Oh boy do I love biotech, one
Oh boy do I love biotech, one day the stock is $10, then the FDA approves the drug, and the next day its $20....
In any other sector, that's called a reverse split.
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