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Learn how markets work.

Plain-English guides to stocks, company accounts, inflation, interest rates, commodities, and more. Each one is worked through on a real example, with real numbers, and all of them are free to read.

Ten reading paths.

Each path runs from the basic idea to the advanced one. Read a path in order, or pick any guide.

Start with these four.

What Is a Stock?What Is an ETF?What Is Inflation, and What Causes It?What Is Systematic Investing?

I

Your first investment

From what a share is to a first portfolio of funds.

Start here

  1. What Is a Stock?
  2. How Does the Stock Market Work?
  3. What Is the S&P 500?
Show the other 31 guides ↓Hide these guides ↑
  1. What Is an Index Fund?
  2. What Is an ETF?
  3. Compound Interest Explained
  4. What Are Asset Classes?
  5. How to Invest in Stocks

Buying and holding

  1. What Does a Market Maker Do?
  2. Bid-Ask Spread
  3. Market Order vs Limit Order
  4. How Much Money Do I Need to Start Investing?
  5. Index Funds vs ETFs
  6. SPY vs VOO
  7. Dollar-Cost Averaging vs Lump Sum
  8. Time in the Market vs Timing

Choosing funds

  1. Sector ETFs
  2. SOXX vs SMH
  3. How ETFs Perform in a Crisis
  4. S&P 500 vs FTSE All-World vs Nasdaq-100
  5. Equal Weight vs Market Cap
  6. Small Caps vs Large Caps
  7. SGOV vs SHV vs BIL

Growing your money

  1. How Much Does Inflation Erode Savings?
  2. Rule of 72
  3. Stocks vs Bonds
  4. How Much Cash Should a Portfolio Hold?
  5. What If You Invest $100 a Month for 10 Years?
  6. What If You Invest $500 a Month for 20 Years?
  7. If You Invested $10,000 in the S&P 500 10 Years Ago
  8. Why Is the Stock Market Down Today?

Dividends

  1. What Is a Dividend?
  2. Ex-Dividend Date Explained
  3. How Are Dividends Taxed?

II

Company accounts and valuation

Read the accounts, then put a number on a share.

Start here

  1. What Is Revenue?
  2. How to Read an Income Statement
  3. Earnings Per Share
Show the other 23 guides ↓Hide these guides ↑
  1. GAAP vs Non-GAAP Earnings
  2. What Is EBITDA?
  3. How to Read a Balance Sheet
  4. How to Read a Cash Flow Statement
  5. What Is Free Cash Flow?

Returns and multiples

  1. Return on Equity
  2. What Is ROIC?
  3. What Is the P/E Ratio?
  4. Forward P/E vs Trailing P/E
  5. What Is Enterprise Value, and Why Use It Over Market Cap?
  6. EV/EBITDA Explained

Valuing a share

  1. What Is a DCF?
  2. What Is WACC?
  3. How to Estimate the Cost of Equity
  4. What Is Terminal Value?
  5. What Is a Reverse DCF?
  6. How to Value a Stock

Valuation in practice

  1. What Is Value Investing?
  2. Apple DCF: A Worked Discounted Cash Flow
  3. Alphabet DCF
  4. Amazon DCF
  5. Are Share Buybacks Good?
  6. Mergers and Acquisitions

III

Companies and sectors

What the largest companies do, and how their sectors earn.

Start here

  1. What Are the 11 Stock Market Sectors?
  2. Magnificent 7 Stocks
  3. Platform Business Model
Show the other 33 guides ↓Hide these guides ↑
  1. Software Stocks
  2. AI Data Centre Stocks
  3. Space Stocks
  4. Oil and Gas Industry
  5. Crypto Stocks Explained

Big tech

  1. What Does Apple Do?
  2. What Does Microsoft Do?
  3. What Does Alphabet Do?
  4. What Does Netflix Do?
  5. What Does Tesla Do?

Chips

  1. The Semiconductor Value Chain, From Design to Factory
  2. What Does TSMC Do?
  3. What Does ASML Do?
  4. What Does Lam Research Do?
  5. What Does Intel Do?
  6. AMD vs Intel
  7. TSMC vs Intel
  8. Nvidia vs AMD

Payments and energy

  1. What Does Visa Do?
  2. How Card Payments Work
  3. What Does ExxonMobil Do?
  4. What Does Coinbase Do?

$10,000 ten years ago: funds and big tech

  1. If You Invested $10,000 in QQQ 10 Years Ago
  2. If You Had Invested $10,000 in Apple 10 Years Ago
  3. If You Invested $10,000 in Microsoft 10 Years Ago
  4. If You Invested $10,000 in Amazon 10 Years Ago
  5. If You Invested $10,000 in Alphabet 10 Years Ago
  6. If You Invested $10,000 in Meta 10 Years Ago

$10,000 ten years ago: chips and growth

  1. If You Invested $10,000 in Nvidia 10 Years Ago
  2. If You Invested $10,000 in Tesla 10 Years Ago
  3. If You Invested $10,000 in AMD 10 Years Ago
  4. If You Invested $10,000 in Netflix 10 Years Ago
  5. Invested $10,000 in Palantir at the 2020 Listing

IV

Inflation and the economy

The releases that move markets, in the order they make sense.

Start here

  1. What Is Inflation, and What Causes It?
  2. Types of Inflation
  3. What Is CPI, and How Is It Measured?
Show the other 27 guides ↓Hide these guides ↑
  1. How to Read the CPI Report
  2. What Is Year Over Year Inflation?
  3. What Is PCE Inflation, and Why Does the Fed Prefer It?
  4. CPI vs PCE
  5. Core vs Headline Inflation

Jobs and growth

  1. What Are Nonfarm Payrolls?
  2. What Is the Unemployment Rate?
  3. What Is GDP?
  4. How to Read the US Jobs Report
  5. What Is the JOLTS Report?
  6. ADP vs Nonfarm Payrolls
  7. GDP vs GNP vs GDP Per Capita
  8. Economic Data Revisions

Recession signals

  1. What Is Deflation?
  2. What Is a Recession?
  3. What Is Stagflation?
  4. Baa Credit Spreads Hit 6.16 Points in 2008
  5. Sahm Rule
  6. Recession Indicators
  7. Economic Calendar

Money and debt

  1. FRED Economic Data
  2. What Is M2 Money Supply?
  3. How Banks Create Money
  4. Does Money Printing Cause Inflation?
  5. What Is Fiscal Policy?
  6. Government Debt
  7. What Is a Real Interest Rate?

V

The Fed, bonds and currencies

How the Fed sets rates, how bonds price them, and what moves a currency.

Start here

  1. What Does the Fed Do?
  2. Who Owns the Federal Reserve?
  3. FOMC Members 2026
Show the other 46 guides ↓Hide these guides ↑
  1. Why Does the Fed Target 2% Inflation?
  2. How the Fed Sets Rates
  3. What Is the Fed Funds Rate?
  4. What Is the Taylor Rule, and Does the Fed Follow It?
  5. How to Read an FOMC Statement, Line by Line

Reading the Fed

  1. FOMC Minutes
  2. What Is the Fed Dot Plot?
  3. Fed Blackout Period 2026
  4. FOMC Meeting Schedule 2026
  5. FOMC Meeting Dates 2027
  6. Will Interest Rates Go Down?
  7. What Is a Futures Contract?
  8. What Are Fed Funds Futures?

Bonds and yields

  1. Treasury Bills, Notes and Bonds
  2. Bond Prices and Yields
  3. What Is the Yield Curve?
  4. Inverted Yield Curve
  5. 10 Year Treasury Yield
  6. Why Mortgage Rates Follow the 10-Year Treasury Yield
  7. What Are TIPS Bonds?
  8. What Is Breakeven Inflation?

Rate cycles and bond funds

  1. Interest Rates vs Inflation
  2. Fed Rate Hikes 2022
  3. Fed Rate Cuts and Stocks
  4. Paul Volcker and the 1980s Rate Shock
  5. TLT Bonds
  6. IEF vs TLT
  7. Bond Market Crash 2022

The balance sheet and funding markets

  1. What Is the Repo Market?
  2. SOFR vs LIBOR
  3. What Is Quantitative Easing?
  4. Quantitative Tightening
  5. Fed Balance Sheet Explained
  6. What Are Bank Reserves?
  7. What Is the Reverse Repo Facility?
  8. Standing Repo Facility

Currencies

  1. How Exchange Rates Work
  2. What Moves EUR/USD?
  3. Why the US Dollar Is the Reserve Currency
  4. What Moves USD/JPY?
  5. The Yen Carry Trade
  6. Yen Carry Trade Unwind

The Bank of Japan

  1. What Are JGBs?
  2. Bank of Japan Negative Rates
  3. Bank of Japan Bond Purchases
  4. BOJ Meeting Schedule

VI

Commodities

Gold and oil, each tested on real data.

Gold

  1. What Drives the Gold Price?
  2. Is Gold a Safe Haven?
  3. How Do Gold ETFs Work?
Show the other 10 guides ↓Hide these guides ↑
  1. Will the Gold Price Go Down?
  2. Why Are Central Banks Buying Gold?
  3. Gold vs Stocks

Oil

  1. How the Oil Market Works
  2. What Is OPEC+?
  3. Contango and Backwardation
  4. Negative Oil Prices

Inflation hedges

  1. Is Gold an Inflation Hedge?
  2. Is Bitcoin an Inflation Hedge?
  3. Gold vs Bitcoin

VII

Crypto

How Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana work, what they cost to use, and where the risks sit.

Start here

  1. What Is Bitcoin?
  2. What Is Ethereum?
  3. How Does the Bitcoin Network Work?
Show the other 20 guides ↓Hide these guides ↑
  1. What Is Solana?
  2. What Is XRP?
  3. What Are Stablecoins?
  4. What Are Gas Fees?
  5. Layer 1 vs Layer 2

Comparing coins

  1. Bitcoin vs Ethereum
  2. Solana vs Ethereum
  3. Bitcoin vs Solana
  4. Bitcoin vs Ethereum vs Solana in 2026

Bitcoin cycles and risk

  1. Bitcoin Halving Cycle
  2. Spot Bitcoin ETFs
  3. Bitcoin Volatility vs Stocks
  4. Bitcoin Crash History
  5. If You Invested $10,000 in Bitcoin 10 Years Ago
  6. Crypto Liquidations Explained
  7. Is Crypto Safe on an Exchange?
  8. Binance Hack of $6.34 Billion

Crypto and the wider market

  1. What Does Strategy (MSTR) Do?
  2. AI Agent Payments
  3. Will the CLARITY Act Pass?

VIII

Reading a chart

The common indicators and market sayings, each tested rather than asserted.

Moving averages

  1. What Is a Moving Average?
  2. 200 Day Moving Average
  3. Moving Average Crossovers
Show the other 20 guides ↓Hide these guides ↑
  1. What Is a Golden Cross?
  2. What Is a Death Cross, and Should You Sell?
  3. Why the Best Moving Average for One Fund Fails on Another

Indicators

  1. What Is the MACD Indicator?
  2. What Is the RSI Indicator?
  3. What Are Bollinger Bands?
  4. ATR Indicator
  5. What Is Volatility?
  6. Support and Resistance
  7. Does Fibonacci Retracement Work?
  8. What Is Market Breadth?

Signals and trends

  1. What Are Trading Signals?
  2. What Is Momentum Investing, and Does It Still Work?
  3. What Is Trend Following, and Does It Still Work?
  4. FOMC Stock Market

Market sayings, tested

  1. Does Buy the Dip Work?
  2. Buying at All Time Highs
  3. Santa Claus Rally
  4. Sell in May and Go Away?
  5. Fat Tails in Markets

IX

Funds, investors and market history

Who runs money, what they charge, and what past crashes show.

Start here

  1. Mutual Fund vs ETF
  2. What Is a Hedge Fund?
  3. Hedge Fund Fees
Show the other 23 guides ↓Hide these guides ↑
  1. Long/Short Equity Explained, With a Worked Example
  2. What Is a Multi-Manager Hedge Fund?
  3. What Is a Fund of Hedge Funds?
  4. Hedge Fund vs Private Equity vs Venture Capital
  5. Do Hedge Funds Beat the Market?

Firms and investors

  1. Citadel Hedge Fund
  2. Bridgewater Associates
  3. Jim Simons
  4. Who Is Aswath Damodaran?
  5. Scott Bessent

How institutions work

  1. Buy Side vs Sell Side
  2. How Pension Funds Invest
  3. How Investment Banks Make Money
  4. What Is 'Real Money' in Markets?
  5. Investor Track Records

Crashes and recoveries

  1. The 1929 Stock Market Crash and the Great Depression
  2. What Was Black Wednesday?
  3. Dot Com Bubble
  4. COVID Crash 2020
  5. Tariff Crash April 2025
  6. Stocks During Recessions
  7. Stock Market Recovery Time
  8. Will the Stock Market Crash?

X

Systematic investing

How a rule-based process works, and how to judge one.

Start here

  1. What Is Systematic Investing?
  2. Systematic vs Discretionary Investing
  3. What Is Rules-Based Investing?
Show the other 30 guides ↓Hide these guides ↑
  1. Quant Investing for Beginners
  2. Systematic vs Passive Investing

Measuring risk

  1. What Is Stock Beta?
  2. Does CAPM Work?
  3. What Is Standard Deviation in Investing?
  4. What Is a Drawdown?
  5. What Is a Good Sharpe Ratio?
  6. What Is the Equity Risk Premium?
  7. CAGR vs Average Return

Building a portfolio

  1. Correlation Investing
  2. Correlation in a Crash
  3. How Many Stocks to Diversify?
  4. The 60/40 Portfolio: Is It Dead?
  5. Position Sizing
  6. Do Stop Losses Work?

Testing a system

  1. What Is Backtesting?
  2. How to Read a Backtest Report, Line by Line
  3. Can Systematic Investing Beat the S&P 500?
  4. Ensemble Models in Trading
  5. Right for years: edge or luck?
  6. What Is Systematic Bond Investing?

Behaviour

  1. What Is Behavioural Finance?
  2. Base Rate Investing
  3. Loss Aversion
  4. Investor Behaviour Gap

Market efficiency

  1. Efficient Market Hypothesis
  2. Why Nobel Economists Disagree About Market Efficiency
  3. Why Is the S&P 500 So Hard to Beat?
  4. Does Value Investing Still Work?
  5. Do Most Stocks Lose to Treasury Bills?

Search every guide.

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Browse by topic.

Every guide sits under one topic. Each is worked through on a real example with real numbers.

Investing Basics

Stocks, funds, orders, accounts, and how markets are built.

Company Accounts & Valuation

Every statement line with Magnificent 7 examples, ratios, and DCF.

Companies & Sectors

What each company does, peer comparisons, and how a sector earns.

Economy & Macro Data

Inflation, GDP, jobs, and each data release.

Rates, Central Banks & FX

Bonds, yield curves, the Fed and its peers, and currencies.

Commodities & Crypto

Oil, gold, metals, Bitcoin, and stablecoins.

Trading & Technical Analysis

Indicators, each one tested, plus patterns, futures, and options.

Portfolio, Risk & Quant

Risk, drawdowns, factors, statistics, and behavioural finance.

Investors, Funds & History

Soros, Druckenmiller, Burry, hedge funds, pensions, and crises.

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YX Insights publishes research for information and education. It is not personal advice and not a managed account: you decide what to do with your own money. Capital is at risk. Past and backtested performance do not guarantee future returns.