You should always do your due diligence before investing in any stocks. But where exactly should you go to conduct your research?
There are endless websites that provide stock advice, but not all are trustworthy or created by experts. The websites listed below are all reputable and are some of the best stock advisor websites available.
Best Stock Advisor Websites & Services—Top Picks
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$99 for 1st year; $199 renewal
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7-day free trial. Premium: $269/yr.* Pro: $2,400/yr.
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$300 for 1st year; $499 renewal
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10% discount: $449/yr.*
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What Is a Stock Advice Website?
Stock advice websites help you choose which stocks to invest in, while still letting you make your own final investment decisions. Top stock advice websites offer detailed screener criteria, characteristics for what they believe makes a great stock pick, exemplary performance compared to a relevant benchmark, and ownership of losing picks with detailed breakdowns of where they went wrong with that choice.
Motley Fool, and other top services, provide researched, vetted stock recommendations that go through extensive due diligence before reaching users.
What Is the Best Stock Advice Subscription?
If I could only recommend one stock advice website, I would choose Motley Fool Stock Advisor. Motley Fool has been around for nearly 30 years and has earned a well-respected reputation for their continued outperformance.
For reasons further laid out below, I think this stock advice subscription should get you all the long-term stock performance you need for your portfolio. Their long and successful track record has earned them the top spot on this list.
Who Has the Best Stock Picking Record?
It shouldn’t come as much of a surprise given my recommendation made above, but Motley Fool’s Stock Advisor has the best stock picking record of the services mentioned in this article.
The Motley Fool Stock Advisor stock subscription service has returned 740% through July 24, 2024, since its inception in February 2002. This number is calculated by averaging the return of all stock recommendations it has made over the past 22 years. Comparatively, the S&P 500 Index has returned 163% over that same time frame. Motley Fool’s solid track record should instill trust in potential users looking for a stock advice subscription service.
1. Motley Fool Stock Advisor (Best Stock Advisor Service)
- Available: Sign up here
- Price: Discounted price for the first year (shown below)
Motley Fool’s signature product, Stock Advisor, aims to provide investors with one thing: top picks for market-beating stocks from the site’s co-founders.
Stock Advisor is an online investment service that espouses my favorite, plain-vanilla trading style: buy-and-hold. Fool analysts provide recommendations for both “Steady Eddies” and potential high-flying stocks with sound fundamentals—an ideal combination of holdings if you want to generate strong performance without risking extremely high volatility.
Importantly, Stock Advisor doesn’t just give you a list of tickers and call it a day—it also provides investment rationales and research for each pick to help educate you before you buy.
- Motley Fool Stock Advisor is a stock service that provides recommendations for both "steady Eddie" and high-flying stocks, as well as a few ETFs for investors who want diversified holdings, too.
- Just getting started? Stock Advisor provides 10 "Foundational Stocks" you can use to anchor your portfolio.
- You're not alone! Stock Advisor membership also gives you access to a community of investors who also want to outperform the market and love talking shop.
- Enjoy access to GamePlan: Motley Fool's financial planning hub, which includes advice on personal finances, taxes, retirement, and more, as well as calculators and other financial tools.
- Limited-Time Offer: Get your first year with Stock Advisor for $99 (vs. $199 usual value)—a 50% discount for new members!
- Discounted introductory price
- Strong outperformance above S&P 500
- High overall average return for stock picks
- High renewal price
- Not every stock is a winner
What Do Stock Advisor Subscribers Get?
Each month, subscribers receive two stock recommendations chosen by Motley Fool analysts, which previously included both co-founders, Tom and David Gardner. Users also have access to 10 recommended stocks at any given time and a variety of educational materials. As mentioned, many people find looking through previous picks a helpful learning tool.
And now, Stock Advisor membership provides access to Motley Fool GamePlan: a hub for retirement and financial planning content and tools to improve not just your portfolio, but your entire financial life.
Optionally, subscribers can opt-in for email or text message alerts to receive timely announcements. The complete service costs a discounted price for the initial year and can be tried risk-free for 30 days with a full refund if you aren’t satisfied.
2. Motley Fool Epic (Stock Picks for Any Investor)
- Available: Sign up here
- Price: Discounted price for the first year (shown below)
Motley Fool Epic isn’t itself a stock-picking service—instead, it’s a bundled selection of four popular Motley Fool stock recommendation products, three of which you can only enjoy by becoming an Epic member:
- Stock Advisor: Buy-and-hold stock picks designed to deliver consistent performance with less volatility. Stock Advisor is the only one of these services you can subscribe to individually.
- Rule Breakers: Stocks that have massive growth potential, whether they’re at the forefront of emerging industries or disrupting the status quo in long-established businesses.
- Hidden Gems: Stocks of medium-to-large businesses, selected by Fool CEO and co-founder Tom Gardner for their “all-in, visionary leadership teams.” More so than the other services, Hidden Gems is mindful of macroeconomic and market environments—and how they might dictate how aggressively you should invest.
- Dividend Investor: This recommendation service revolves around producing equity income. Fool analysts target companies that deliver above-average yields and dividend growth, with the hope of producing both competitive total returns and an income stream that should carry you through retirement.
Epic members will get five new picks per month across the various services, can access all active recommendations, and also view Cautious, Moderate, and Aggressive strategies including specific stock allocations.
But Epic is more than just a pile of recommendation services. Among other features, an Epic membership also unlocks access to …
- Fool IQ+: Fool IQ, which comes with Stock Advisor, provides essential financial data and news summaries about all U.S.-listed publicly traded stocks. With Epic, you get Fool IQ+, which includes all the features in Fool IQ, as well as a much wider variety of financial analysis data (earnings coverage, insider trading data, analyst opinions, and more) and advanced charting options.
- GamePlan+: GamePlan, which comes with Stock Advisor, is a hub of financial planning content and tools. GamePlan+, which you get through Epic, delivers a wider array of articles and tools, as well as more in-depth coverage.
- Epic Opportunities: A members-only podcast.
3. Seeking Alpha (Best for Investment Research + Stock Recommendations)
- Available: Sign up here
- Price: 7-day free trial for Premium and Pro. Premium: $269/yr*. Pro: $2,400/yr.
Seeking Alpha Premium caters to the needs of intermediate and advanced investors looking for an affordable, all-inclusive, one-stop-shop for their investing needs. Seeking Alpha Premium acts as an all-in-one investing research and recommendation service that offers insightful analysis of financial news, stocks, and more—all designed to help you make better investing decisions.
Whether you’re looking to invest on the go or dedicate time for more in-depth research and analysis, Seeking Alpha provides features that meet your needs.
No other site provides what Seeking Alpha does, providing unlimited access to everything from:
- Earnings calls transcripts
- Seeking Alpha Author Ratings and Author Performance metrics
- 10 years worth of financial statements
- Ability to compare stocks side-by-side with peers
- Access to dividend and earnings forecasts and much, much more.
How Has Seeking Alpha Premium Performed?
Seeking Alpha’s Premium subscriptions provide access to the service’s Stock Quant Ratings. These represent collections of the best (to the worst)-rated stocks according to three independent investment resources provided on Seeking Alpha’s website.
These cross checks and validations come from: (1) the Seeking Alpha Quant Model, (2) Seeking Alpha independent contributors, and (3) Wall Street analysts. The list of best stock recommendations gets further vetted by quantitative and fundamental analysis.
For example, the service offers its Triple Rated Top Stocks collection, which contains a listing of the top rated securities—all of which get validated by “Very Bullish” or “Bullish” ratings held on the platform.
All this attention to detail pays off, too.
Have a look at the dramatic market outperformance seen by these Top Rated Stocks from Seeking Alpha Premium as compared to the S&P 500 (total return with dividends reinvested):
What to Expect from Seeking Alpha’s Paid Plans
Seeking Alpha has over 16,000 active contributors sharing well-written stock analysis. In-house editors vet these pieces before being read and discussed by millions of people. Reading different opinions about the same stock helps investors develop their own informed opinions on the likelihood a stock will rise or fall. I recommend this approach when learning how to research stocks.
In addition to diverse, deep-dive research articles, Seeking Alpha’s website has fundamental analysis tools, a Trending News feed, crowdsourced debates, and market data. Users can create their own portfolios to follow favorite stocks, see how choices perform and receive email alerts or push notifications. You also have access to podcasts and video content.
While the website has a significant amount of information, some features remain reserved for the Premium Plan and Pro Plan members.
Seeking Alpha Premium
With a Seeking Alpha Premium subscription, you will enjoy unparalleled access with an ad-lite interface across your user experience. Seeking Alpha Premium can help you manage your portfolio with a large investing community so you can better understand the financial world. Access more premium content, author ratings and performance to get ideas for your next investment.
Premium plan members can see the ratings of authors whose articles they read. It’s useful to know if you’re reading a piece written by someone with a top record or a poor track record.
“Expert” analyses are reserved for Premium members as well. This plan includes a stock screener letting you filter by average analyst rating and gain access to listen to conference calls and other presentations.
Seeking Alpha Pro
A Seeking Alpha Pro subscription comes with all the features of Seeking Alpha Premium, but also comes with extra features like:
- The Top Ideas recommendation list
- Exclusive newsletter subscriptions and interviews
- VIP Editorial Concierge
- Seeking Alpha Pro screener for investing ideas
- No ads—providing you with fewer interruptions to your reading experience.
Why Subscribe to Seeking Alpha?
In short, Seeking Alpha distills down the relevant financial information for you so you don’t have to—making it easy for anyone interested in self-directed investments to have a chance at outperforming the market. Now’s your chance with Seeking Alpha’s Paid Plans!
Consider starting a free trial to take advantage of SA’s Premium services and see if they make sense for your needs.
- Seeking Alpha Premium and Pro help you find profitable investing ideas, improve your portfolio, research stocks better and faster as well as track the news to find investing opportunities.
- Receive up to 15 investing newsletters filled with stock research and analysis, commentary and recommendations.
- Get access to the world's largest investing community.
- Use Seeking Alpha Premium's Seeking Alpha Stock Ratings to find stocks likely to outperform and make you money.
- Seeking Alpha Premium's proprietary quant records have an impressive track record leading to massive market outperformance.
- Special offer: New subscribers through our link receive a $30 discount off the price of Seeking Alpha Premium in their first year.
- Active community of engaged investors and analysts
- Stock screeners, quantitative tools for stock analysis
- Strong track record of market outperformance on stock ratings
- Minimal mutual fund coverage
4. Seeking Alpha’s Alpha Picks (Best Data-Driven Stock Recommendation Service)
- Available: Sign up here
- Price: Discounted rate for first-time subscribers
Are you looking for a way to beat the market consistently? Seeking Alpha’s Alpha Picks might be a great option to consider.
Alpha Picks is a stock selection service that provides you with two of the best stock picks each month that SA determines have the greatest chance for price upside. They base their selections on fundamentals such as valuation, growth, profitability, and momentum—not hype.
The stock selection process relies on Seeking Alpha’s proprietary, data-driven computer scoring system to screen and recommend stocks for more conservative “buy-and-hold” investors.
And if results from their backtest (run from 2010 to 2022) are any indication, historical simulations of the methodology behind their strategy prove it has worked: Alpha Picks’ recommendations outperformed the S&P 500 Index by 180 percentage points (+470% for SA vs. +290% for the S&P 500).
A bit more detail about how this works: Alpha Picks relies on the existing Seeking Alpha Quant model available to Seeking Alpha Premium and Pro users, but with a bit of modification. Namely, all recommendations must meet the following criteria:
- Hold a Strong Buy Quant rating for a minimum of 75 days
- Market cap greater than $500 million
- Stock price greater than $10
- Is a publicly traded common stock (no American Depository Receipts [ADRs])
- Be the highest-rated stock at the time of selection that has not been previously recommended within the past year (Alpha Picks releases one pick at the start of the month, another in the middle).
If you sign up for the service, you can expect the following:
- Two long-term stock picks to buy and hold for at least two years, delivered every month
- Detailed explanations from Seeking Alpha behind why they rate each stock pick so highly
- Notifications when a recommendation changes
- Regular updates on current Buy recommendations
The service, designed for busy professionals interested in building a portfolio that outpaces the market but without the time to commit to finding these opportunities, is worth considering. If you’re interested, you can sign up for a discounted first-year price of $449.
- Seeking Alpha's Alpha Picks is a stock picking service designed for busy professionals who might not have the time needed to select stocks for their own portfolio.
- Using a proprietary computer-scoring model, Alpha Picks makes "buy-and-hold" picks that last at least two years.
- Since its launch in 2022, Alpha Picks has delivered market-beating performance, with a remarkable 180% increase compared to the S&P 500's 61%.
- Rigorous backtesting also has shown Alpha Picks' methodology would have strongly outperformed the S&P 500 index between 2010 and 2022 (+470% vs. +290%).
- Special Offer: Receive $50 off the first year's subscription price by signing up via our link.
- Data-driven, computer-generated stock selection process
- Avoids human bias
- Strong backtest performance vs. S&P 500 index
- Competitive price point
- Not enough actual performance data
- No frills, just stock picks and info about them
5. Zacks Investment Research (Best for Daily Trade Recommendations)
- Available: Sign up here
- Price: $59/mo. or $495/yr. if paid upfront for Zacks Investor Collection; $299/mo. for Zacks Ultimate
Zacks Investment Research also sits among the best stock market research websites, delivering a subscription-based service that you can use to improve your own due diligence or lean on for stock selection.
The investment research site has a free service that provides general market data and information about the financial markets and business news. One of its popular features is the Bull and Bear of the Day, where the service selects two stocks and rates them as a Bull (strong buy) or Bear (strong sell) pick.
However, the Zacks Premium service unlocks access to:
- The Zacks #1 Rank List to develop your investment strategies
- Focus List portfolio of long-term stocks
- Custom stock screener
- Equity research reports and more
The Portfolio Tracker provides constant monitoring of your stocks to help you decide if you should buy, hold, or sell.
If you want even more firepower, Zacks Investor Collection provides access to Zacks Premium and other services, including ETF Investor and Stocks Under $10. You can try the service for 30 days for just $1. After that, it’s $59/mo. or discounted to $495/yr. if paid upfront.
Investors who desire even more information can get Zacks Ultimate. This plan provides even more exclusive services, including Black Box Trader, Blockchain Innovators, Marijuana Innovators, Options Trader, and more. After a $1 30-day trial, Zacks Ultimate costs $299 per month.
- Zacks Investment Research offers several research products to provide the information subscribers want to know about market opportunities
- Features include: Zacks #1 Rank List, Industry Rank List, Premium Screens, Focus List, Research Reports, Earnings ESP Filter, Zacks #5 Rank List
6. Morningstar (Best for Fundamentals-Driven Investors)
- Available: Sign up here
- Price: Free 7-day trial. Then $34.95/mo., or $199/yr. (53% savings vs. monthly) when you sign up through our link.*
Morningstar Investor is a rich platform of investment research tools designed for the buy-and-hold crowd, and it plugs investors into one of the world’s foremost sources for mutual fund and ETF data and analysis.
Morningstar’s ratings are among the service’s most revered features. The original Star Rating—which measures a fund’s risk-adjusted past returns—has been around since 1985 and helped steer countless investors toward cheaper, better-constructed mutual funds and ETFs. But Morningstar doesn’t just look to the past. Its forward-looking Medalist Ratings use traits such as a fund’s parent organization, the managers responsible for making decisions, and fund strategies to determine a fund’s ability to outperform over the long term. You must be a Morningstar Investor subscriber to access Medalist Ratings.
Morningstar also provides a wealth of information and comparable data points about mutual funds and ETFs—fees, risk, portfolio composition, performance, distributions, and more. Morningstar experts also provide detailed explanations and analysis of many of the funds the site covers.
Stock owners shouldn’t feel left out—Morningstar also provides everything you need for stock research, including equity data, corporate financials, analysis, and even Star Ratings of publicly traded companies.
With Morningstar Investor, you can also:
- Seamlessly and securely link your external accounts to get a holistic view of your assets from one simple dashboard
- Use Morningstar Portfolio X-Ray®, which evaluates what you hold from numerous angles—asset allocation, stock sector, valuation, fees, and more—and can identify any overlaps between accounts that might impact just how diversified you are (or aren’t!)
- Set up stock and fund watchlists
- Enjoy stock news and commentary that’s tailored to your holdings
- Screen for securities that match your investing goals using a variety of performance and valuation metrics
- Follow Morningstar authors so you can check out their latest articles, videos, and podcasts as soon as they’re posted
Not sure if Morningstar Investor is right for you? Try it out with a free seven-day trial. You can check out the current deal, as well as discounted rates for students and teachers, in our details box below.
- Morningstar Investor offers expert research, investing analysis, and advisor-grade portfolio management tools that are tailor-made for buy-and-hold investors.
- Morningstar is one of the most prized sources of mutual fund and exchange-traded fund (ETF) data in the world.
- How does your portfolio stack up? Put it through Morningstar's Portfolio X-Ray, which will provide insights such as whether you have too many overlapping holdings or whether you're paying too much in fees.
- Special Offer 1: Click our sign-up link to receive $50 off your first year of Morningstar Investor. (Annual plan only.)
- Special Offer 2: Students receive one year of Morningstar Investor access for just $25!
- Special Offer 3: Teachers receive a 60% discount on Morningstar Investor access.
- Top-flight fund research and analysis
- Portfolio management tool
- Powerful screener
- Watchlists
- Tailored news and commentary
- Below-average charting
- High monthly billing rate
7. Mindful Trader (Best for Swing Trading Advice)
- Available: Sign up here
- Price: $47/mo
Many people who engage in algorithmic trading do so without a clear understanding of the risks. They may not realize that they’re taking on more risk than they can handle. While there’s nothing inherently wrong with using an automated system to trade, it can be very risky if you don’t understand how it works and what you’re getting into.
Mindful Trader is designed to help investors make better choices about their trading strategies by providing them with information about market conditions, as well as strategies that have worked in the past.
The software also helps users develop their own systems based on historical results and their own personal preferences. Further, you can use the service as a stock advisor through swing trade opportunities that have timed expiration dates.
- Use Mindful Trader's statistical edge to earn alpha in the market and create long-term wealth
- Data-driven trade strategies that rely on historical probabilities to identify swing trade alerts
- Useful for easy-to-follow trade alerts in real-time
8. The Maley Report (Best for Comprehensive Investment Advice)
- Available: Sign up here
- Price: $49/mo or $490/year
The Maley Report is run by Wall Street veteran Matt Maley, who you may have seen quoted in publications such as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, CNBC.com, Bloomberg print, and Reuters. He’s well-known for using technical, macro, and fundamental analysis to make timely calls on specific stocks, ETFs, and more.
Maley posts free articles on Marketfy’s website, but for the best features, you’ll need to be a paid subscriber for $49/month or $490/year.
The subscription comes with a video library teaching stock market strategies, Maley’s blog posts, a resource page with educational materials, and an email newsletter describing the overall market. An activity feed makes it easy to see all his blogs, videos, and trade alerts as they are posted in real-time.
- The Maley Report goes beyond the fundamentals to marry macro, fundamental and technical analysis, creating a complete picture of markets
- Delivers actionable calls at key turning points with individual stocks, groups and asset classes
Best Stock Advisors for Day Trading
While this list primarily focuses on long-term investment-oriented stock subscriptions, you may also have interest in the best stock advisors for day trading.
9. Trade Ideas (Best for Active Day and Momentum Traders)
- Available: Sign up here
- Price: Trade of the Week Newsletter: Free; $1,068/yr. for Standard (paid annually); $2,136/yr. for Premium (paid annually); discounts available with a code found in the box below
Trade Ideas employs an artificial intelligence-powered assistant named Holly. This AI becomes your virtual research analyst who never sleeps and instead sifts through technicals, fundamentals, social media, earnings, and more to pick stocks as real-time trade recommendations.
Holly stays busy, too. She runs more than 1 million simulated trades each night and morning before the markets open with more than 60 proprietary algorithms to find you the highest-probability, most risk-appropriate opportunities to invest in stocks.
This stock scanning and analysis tool doesn’t stop there, though. You can also build your own scanners and screeners with over 500 data points and indicators to choose from. You can backtest your trading strategies, and also forward-test them in the real-time trade simulator. This allows you to learn, test, and optimize, without risking your own money.
The powerful service allows you to access real-time streaming trading ideas on simultaneous charts to learn how to trade into risk-reward balanced trades. In other words: You can invest and learn at the same time.
Where Trade Ideas excels
Where Trade Ideas excels is not only giving you the data and ideas you haven’t seen elsewhere, but also how to manage your money. The AI-powered smart risk levels on every chart are suitable for both long-term investors and active traders.
As the stock market evolves, TI’s software adjusts levels and the trading plan to match. The best part? You can learn how to do all of this without risking your principal through a real-time simulated trading environment.
After you’ve grown comfortable with the service and trading, you can choose to go live with the trade ideas and start investing real money by connecting directly through a brokerage like Interactive Brokers or E*Trade. (The full list of available brokers you can use through the service is available on Trade Ideas’ site.)
I’m a newsletter and alert aficionado, so I should point out a couple of Trade Ideas products. For one, it has a standalone alert service in the form of a weekly Swing Picks newsletter. This gives you five new trade ideas in your inbox from the company’s model portfolio every Monday. Trade Ideas’ Standard and Premium subscriptions include these stock picks. Trade Ideas also has a free Trade of the Week newsletter highlighting one stock pick TI has identified for members.
How does Trade Ideas find stock picks?
Trade Ideas finds its Strength Alerts by focusing on a unique approach that emphasizes relative strength. They start by identifying the most effective indicators and chart setups, based on their top-performing algorithms. They proceed by applying statistical analysis to assign weighted values to each indicator and chart setup, allowing for a quantitative evaluation of their significance. Advanced server technology allows TI to evaluate every stock in the market using these weights and then sort them based on which achieved the highest score. Their team of experts curates these findings to ensure subscribers receive only the most promising trade recommendations.
While Trade Ideas offers exceptional value, it’s important to note that there’s a considerable investment required. Note that you must sign up for Premium to receive full access to the Holly experience. However, you can enjoy a big discount by using the code mentioned below.
Consider starting your Trade Ideas subscription with no contract involved. Cancel anytime.
- Trade Ideas is a stock market app that teaches you how to trade and invest.
- Using a simulated trading platform, you can learn how to trade and invest without risking actual money.
- The service offers a free newsletter and also AI-powered automated trading for premium subscribers.
- Special Discount: Take 20% off any first month or year of a Trade Ideas subscription using promo code "WEALTHUP".
- Free live trading room that delivers actionable guidance
- In-browser and desktop interface functionality
- Automated trading capabilities
- AI-powered trade suggestions
- No mobile app
- Pricey subscriptions for some traders
10. Top Dog Trading
- Price: $150/mo.
Top Dog Trading is an interactive trading course that teaches traders how to use various indicators and stock analysis tools in order to make more accurate trades. The program provides an overview of a variety of technical analysis techniques, such as drawing trend lines, identifying breakouts, reading candlesticks charts and understanding stop-loss orders.
This course is for beginners or intermediate level stock traders who want great advice on what stocks are best to buy at the moment.
Top Dog Trading also offers a video newsletter service that is delivered to your inbox three times per week. The newsletter reviews Top Dog’s personal stock picks as well as a variety of other subjects, such as market updates and trading tips for beginners.
Should You Buy Recommendations From These Services?
If you have serious interest in investing with these stock advice services, I suggest starting small and cautiously with their recommendations. Consider following along with a paper trading account available through free stock apps. These accounts allow you to place trades without placing actual trades and putting your money at risk.
Apps like Webull, a trading app like Robinhood, offer this functionality for free. By a free paper trading service, you can test the recommendations of the advice services and how they perform relative to the market.
Always Perform Your Own Due Diligence
I recommend several services here because you should never let one single source represent your stock investing choices. If you find an interesting stock pick, research it more on your own. Only after performing your own due diligence should you invest.
Consider pairing some of the best investment research sites to your subscription to get more in-depth and objective views of the stocks recommended. You can also combine these subscriptions with the best investing apps for beginners, allowing you to invest in the market with ease.
Best Stock Advice Services, Subscriptions & Sites
The internet is filled with people who give others stock advice, despite knowing very little about investing. Stick with experts’ opinions when researching stocks you’re considering purchasing.
The websites above use professional analysts to choose investment recommendations and have proven themselves trustworthy over the years. Just remember that stock trading is never without some risk. For that reason, stocks should only be a portion of your well-balanced investment portfolio.