As anticipated, Google Finance launched a fairly extensive redesign and feature changes today. There is much more information included on the home page v. the old layout. Comparison charts can now be created for multiple stocks. Top stocks can be sorted by market cap, price, search popularity, etc. Google has also added in 40 years of stock market data, and created new import tools for those millions of Yahoo Finance and other sites that might like to switch.
Plus, they have a funny video.
It’s funny, I have no interest or investments in the financial sector, but G finance is solid, and a lot of fun to use. I especially love how it ties big news stories to ups and down in the stock price. Plus all the other Ajax-y goodness is well done. Too many sites do Ajax “just because”, but as demonstrated with this site and Gmail, Google knows how to do it right.
One feature I like is the auto complete that suggests the symbol for the company you are looking for. But, it ain’t enought to make me switch from Yahoo Finance, which has much more content than Google Finance. All the AJAX goodness is useless until there is enough content in it.
anyone know if the page is customizable? i check out G finance pretty much daily for companies in my sector, and was a little disappointed when i logged in today. i love all the new info available, but dont really care so much about sector overviews and top movers over $1bn in mkt cap that are now prominent on the page. maybe daytraders will love it.
I don’t think it’s customizable right now, but that would be a good idea. I’d like to see you be able to drag and drop or add different modules like you can with Google Personalized Homepage.
Any points for finding the first boo-boo?
In the market summary section on the home page they list “Eur-USD” and “GBP-USD,” but they’re actually quoting USD-EUR and USD-GBP.
the snap link previewer is really annoying
still a joke. you cannot add major indices to your portfolio. you cannot get a chart for ten year bonds or add that to your portfolio. clearly the “best minds” at google are not working on finance.
@Sean
Everything you mentioned is “Cool Features” not actual tools to help make investment decisions. The ajax doesn’t offer anymore useful tools than Yahoo Finance.
Being a heavy investor, Yahoo Finance gives me much more in tools, articles, discussions, and has a comprehensive portfolio that tracks stocks, bonds, cds, etc. Yahoo does have ajax chart functionality that isn’t as clean as googles, but does the job very well.
Plus points for G-Finance-It’s really clean and easy to see everything in one page.
lol. the video was great. i actually watched the whole thing even though i don’t invest currently.
Hopefully this means Google are actually improving their current products as stated - but call me when there’s an Australian version. I’ve been finding Yahoo’s Australian finance site going seriously downhill in the last 2 years and it would be nice to have some competition.
The Ajax makes a world of difference if you’re viewing a trend of a stock for different time periods. The Yahoo interface of clicking a different link and waiting for a whole new page to load is very cumbersome.
G Finance also has articles and discussions. The community seems to be more vibrant on Y! finance for discussions (from the few stocks I’ve looked at so this is purely anecdotal).
I think the new G Finance has some decent improvements. They’re still behind Y! Finance when it comes to content. Overall, though, I use G Finance to manage my assets and look forward to the competition bringing us better (and FREE!) products. Thanks Google!
They need to consult some actual finance people here because this still sucks. I like the sector views, but their main problem isn’t on the front page, it’s in the quotes. I think it’s very telling that they have a software engineer talking to us in this video, and not someone who might be able to communicate investors a little better.
The Ajax looks pretty, but is totally not useful if you are a person who uses charts a lot to look at stocks. The information displayed, while *could* be useful, just looks like a mess.
I just don’t understand why Google, which has some good technology to leverage such as their search capability and computing network, cannot seem to build a better finance product.
Google could really do with some bonus features not available in existing financial portals. One key feature is the online ability to take snapshots of the graphs they have made available, so that users can include them in their research report or even blog post. I was looking for this feature yesterday, and I suppose necessity is the mother of invention.
One huge thing they are lacking: Data Export. Being able to export financial data is crucial to lot of individual investors who build models by hand using excel, and don’t have the resources to buy software that downloads data automatically for them like professional traders do.
Second, exporting graphs. They have gorgeous graphs, why not allow them to be exported. Even if you put generated by Google Finance in the corner.
Third, making graphs full size and take the entire screen. More screen real estate = more detailed charts.
Gah, Kadakia basically said exactly what’s on my mind — only better (with regards to exporting information, period).
ermmmm didn’t Yahoo do all this 5-6 years ago?
Come on google, you haven’t innovated for almost 2 years now and you are looking increasingly like M$
Anybody really uses Google Finance anyway? I use Yahoo Finance. And Google Finance is the only Google service/app i never use. Anyway, financing is a pretty serious thing, I couldn’t use G Finance just because I’m a google fan.
-Mike
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