# Invest Manual

2004
2005
Raphael Slinckx
2007
Terrence Hall
2010
Enrico Minack
2009
Philip Withnall (philip@tecnocode.co.uk)
GNOME Documentation Project

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GNOME Documentation Team
Terrence
Hall

    teebob21@gmail.com

Enrico
Minack

    enrico-minack@gmx.de

This manual describes version 2.32.0 of Invest.

## Feedback

To report a bug or make a suggestion regarding the Invest application or this manual, follow the directions in the GNOME Feedback Page.

User manual for Invest

## Introduction

The Invest GNOME panel applet downloads current quotes for stocks, stock indices, currencies and precious metals. Quotes are downloaded from Yahoo! Finance and are displayed in a drop-down list.

Invest provides the following features:

- Retrieve quotes for any stock, stock index, currency or precious metal known by Yahoo! Finance

- Quotes are automatically updated every 15 minutes

- The current price, today's change, and a chart of today's changes are displayed

- The currency of the quote is displayed, and if configured, automatically translated into a target currency

- The amount of the increase or decrease in the price since purchase, also translatable into the target currency

- The percentage increase or decrease in the price since purchase

## Getting Started

### Add Invest to a Panel

To add Invest to a GNOME panel, right-click on the panel, then choose Add to Panel. Select Invest in the Add to Panel dialogue, then click OK. Click Close when finished.

### Remove Invest from a Panel

To remove Invest from a GNOME panel, right-click on the icon, then choose Remove From Panel.

### More Information

More information about the GNOME panel can be found in the GNOME Panel documentation.

## Using Invest

Before the applet can provide you with recent quotes, you have to configure it. Quotes can come from different stock exchange centers around the world, so the prices can have different currencies. The automatic translation of currencies can be configured, as well as the translation of your purchases done in different countries. Finally, charts are available for each of your configured quote.

### Configure your Quotes

#### Add New Quotes to the Applet

To add new quotes to Invest, perform the following steps:

1. Right-click on the icon, and select Preferences.

2. Click Add to add a quote to Invest.

3. The default quote is GOOG. It is initially selected for editing so that you can instantly change it. Enter the Symbol of the quote here. If you do not know the symbol of your desired quote, see below.

4. Then, click on the Label of the quote and type its proper name.

5. You can also edit the number of shares you own, the purchase price and the commission.

6. Click Close when you are finished adding quotes.

If you do not know the actual symbol of your quote, go to http://finance.yahoo.com/. Enter the name of the quote in the text field in the upper-left corner of the screen. While typing, it will list you matching quotes. The first column depicts the symbol of the quote, the second column shows the name, and in the third column, the stock exchange of the quote is listed. The currency of the quote may vary among different stock exchange centers, depending on their respective countries. Below, you can see a screenshot of searching for the "yahoo" quote.

Screenshot of Yahoo! Finance when searching a quote.

Invest supports all quotes that can be found at Yahoo! Finance. In particular, these are of the following type.

##### Stocks, Bonds and Securities

These are the majority of quotes that are available. Search or browse on Yahoo! Finance to find out what is there.

##### Stock Indices

All quotes that start with an ^ are actually indices, a quote that represents a number of other quotes' performance. Examples are the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) and the NASDAQ Composite (^IXIC).

##### Currencie rates

Exchange rates between any two currencies are also available. The respective symbol is constructured as follows. Currency AAA in currency BBB, or in other words, how much does currency AAA cost in currency BBB, has the symbol AAABBB=X. If you want to know how much EUR you get for one USD (how much does one USD cost in EUR), you choose USDEUR=X. You can find more information at the currency page of Yahoo! Finance. Currencies are represented using their ISO 4217 currency code.

##### Precious Metals

The ISO 4217 currency code also lists precious metals as currencies. These are Gold, Silver, Palladium and Platinum. Their currency code starts with X, followed by their chemical symbol: XAU, XAG, XPD, and XPT, respectively. With those currency codes, the rate of precious metals in any currency are available via the currency rates described above. To give an example, Gold in USD has the symbol XAUUSD=X. You can even get the reverse (USDXAU=X): how much Gold measured in troy ounce do you get for one USD?

#### View Configured Quotes

To view your configured quotes, click on the Invest icon on the panel. A list of your quotes will appear. To close the list, click the icon again. Notice that quotes are usually 15 minutes delay.

#### Update the Display

To immediately update the information that is displayed in the applet, right-click on the applet, then choose Refresh.

#### Remove Quotes from the Applet

To remove quotes from Invest, perform the following steps:

1. Right-click on the icon, and select Preferences.

2. Click the row containing the quote you wish to remove.

3. Click Remove to delete the listing.

4. Click Close when you are finished.

### Setup Currency Translation

Invest displays all quotes in their original currency as retrieved from Yahoo! Finance. If you wish to have all quotes being displayed in one target currency, this can be configured in the preferences dialog.

1. Right-click on the icon, and select Preferences.

2. Type the target currency into the Currency text field.

3. While you type, the text field will suggest currencies that match entered currency.

4. Choose your target currency.

5. Notice that in your quote list the new Currency Rate column appears.

6. For all purchases where the Price and Commission are given in original currency, the exchange rate at the time of purchase from the origin currency to the target currency has to be given in the Currency Rate field.

7. Click Close when you are finished.

Lets look at this example: You bought one Yahoo! share (YHOO) for 10.00 USD at a currency rate of 0.75 EUR per USD. In other words, the share cost 7.50 EUR. You further paid 5.00 USD comission, equivalent to 3.75 EUR. When you set the target currency to EUR, you either have to enter the EUR (target currency) values and keep the Currency Rate at 0.00, or you enter the USD (original currency) values and enter the EUR per USD exchange rate (USDEUR=X).

The Price and Commission both have to be given in the same currency.

If you want to remove the target currency again, simply clear the Currency text field.

### Chart Options

For each quote in your list, a financial chart is available. To open the financial chart, view the list of configured quotes, and double-click the quote that you wish to chart. The chart parameters can be customized by clicking Options.

#### Date Range

The date range, in the top-right corner of the window, selects the length of time to report on. By default, it gives one day of data, but the following ranges can be choosen: Today, 5 Days, 3 Months, 6 Months, 1 Year, 5 Years, Maximum.

#### Graph Style

Historical price information can be graphed in three different ways. You can select a line chart, bar chart, or candlestick chart.

- Line Chart (l)

  This is the default option. This graphs the historical price information in a familiar manner, connecting each day's closing price with a single line. Line charts for graphing quotes are useful if an analyst is interested only in a closing price each time.

- Bar Chart (b)

  A bar chart represents a full day's activity with a single vertical bar. The top of the vertical line indicates the highest price a security traded during the day, and the bottom represents the lowest price. The closing price is displayed on the right side of the bar, and the opening price is shown on the left side of the bar. One bar represents one day of trading.

- Candlestick Chart (c)

  A candlestick chart in which the open and close prices are represented as the top and bottom of a rectangle surrounding a vertical line connecting the high and low prices. The body of the rectangle is filled if the closing price is lower than the opening price and is left blank if the closing price is higher than the opening price.

#### Moving Average

A moving average is a statistical series of a security's closing prices throughout consecutive trading days. It is typically shown in the same graph as a line chart to indicate trends in prices.

#### Exponential Moving Average

The exponential moving average (EMA) is defined as a moving average calculated by weighting recent values more heavily than older values. This type of moving average reacts faster to recent price changes than a simple moving average. The 12- and 26-day EMAs are popular short-term averages, while EMAs greater than 50 days are used to signal long-term trends.

#### Overlays

Overlays allow you to graph multiple statistical measurements onto a single chart. For example, you can compare the performance of a single quote against that of an index such as the NASDAQ or the DJIA.

#### Indicators

Indicators are used to attempt to predict future financial trends. Proper use of market indicators is beyond the scope of the Invest manual.