The Investment Outlook is derived from Professor Michael B. Lehmann's best-selling book, The Irwin Guide To Using The Wall Street Journal and his popular seminar "Be Your Own Economist". In this course, Professor Lehmann shows you how to obtain the latest economic data on the web from the original source. The course will enable you to interpret the economic data with a graphical analysis that places recent economic events in a historical context. A wealth of background information, embedded in each module, provides all the depth and perspective you will need to understand today's economy.

The Investment Outlook is divided into three separate, highly interactive Lessons. In Lesson 1, Dr. Lehmann explains that you can't measure a company's value (what its stock is worth) until you know its earnings and potential earnings. He introduces you to the government web sites that provide data on profits for the entire economy and manufacturing. These create the context within which to evaluate the performance of individual corporations. After familiarizing yourself with the web sites, you will have the opportunity to examine profits' historical record and learn to make decisions about companies just like the professional economists do on Wall Street.

Lesson 2 is all about Earnings, and especially growing earnings, which drive the stock market. There's a wide divergence among firms, however, in earnings performance and earnings prospects. That's why it's important to invest in an industry whose earnings outlook is rosy. Being alert to changes in the outlook for profits and profitability is crucial to good decision making. In Lesson 1, you already examined the U.S. Census Burea's release on manufacturing corporations to determine their profits and profit margins. The Census Bureau's report also reveals individual industry's performance within the manufacturing sector. Generally speaking, you are better served selecting a stock in a strong industry than a weak one. Although the Census Bureau's data cover manufacturing only, its industry survey illustrates how widely profits can vary among industries. You will also have the opportunity to explore a number of private sites that also group firms and their performance by industry, but extend their purview beyond manufacturing.

Lesson 3 explores the Price/Earnings (P/E) ratio to bridge the gap between earnings and stock-market valuation. The P/E ratio compares the value of a company's shares of stock to the earnings available for each share of stock.This Lesson examines the P/E ratio for each of the nation's major stock-market indexes: the Dow Jones Industrial Average (the Dow), the S&P (Standard and Poor's) 500, and the Nasdaq (National Association of Security Dealers Automated Quotations). You can also find or calculate the P/E ratio for an individual stock and obtain P/E projections for firms and industries.

This Course will assist your ability to rationally evaluate your stock market investments and improve your confidence in your judgment. After completing, you should know how to make the best use of statistics and news on the investment scene. You will understand the paramount importance of profit margins, earnings growth, and the P/E ratio. That is, corporations must enjoy healthy profit margins and strong earnings growth to justify rising stock market values. But you'll learn to keep your eye on the P/E ratio to be sure that stock market values do not speculatively race ahead of earnings growth. This course contains a cautionary tale about the excesses of the late 1990s and the bubble that burst in 2000. It does not purport to give investment advice. Rather, it puts you in a position to be your own economist and make decisions based on teh information that professionals access regularly. We suggest, though, that you always secure competent professional counsel before putting your capital at risk.

Enjoy!