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Seeking Alpha
Type of businessPrivate
Type of site
Financial commentary and analysis
Available inEnglish
Founded2004; 20 years ago (2004)
Headquarters
Ra'anana
,
Israel
Area servedWorldwide
OwnerSeeking Alpha Ltd.
Founder(s)David Jackson
Key peopleDavid Jackson
(Founder and CEO)
IndustryFinance
Employees170
URLseekingalpha.com

Seeking Alpha is a crowd-sourced content service for financial markets.[1] Articles and research covers a broad range of stocks, asset classes, exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and investment strategies. In contrast to other equity research platforms, insight is provided by contributors including a base of investors and industry experts (buy side) rather than sell side.[2][3] Seeking Alpha was founded in 2004 by former Wall Street analyst David Jackson.[4]

In 2011 the company stated it had distribution partnerships with MSN Money, CNBC, Yahoo! Finance, MarketWatch, NASDAQ and TheStreet,[5] although Yahoo Finance ended its relationship with Seeking Alpha on July 28, 2014.[6][7]

As of January 2021, the firm self reported that it had 10 million registered users and attracts over 17 million unique viewers every month[8][9] and that its average visit duration was 4× more than The Economist, Barron's or the Wall Street Journal.[10]

Contributors

The site's content is primarily generated by independent contributors. As of January 2021, compensation for exclusive articles is determined by how many Premium and PRO subscribers read any given article, with additional compensation for articles on under covered tickers.[11]

In 2011, the firm was projected to pay its approximately 550 exclusive article contributors $1.2 million.[12] In January 2021, the company reported that it has over 16,000 contributors who publish over 7,000 articles and transcripts every month[13] and that it covers 8,000 tickers and has an archive of over 1 million articles.[14]

Notable contributors include Henry Blodget and Paco Ahlgren.[citation needed] and Sanjeev Sharma who has accurately predicted the S&P500 since 2009 using a "Sharma Disposable Income Formula and methodology".

Wisdom of Crowds

In 2014, the Review of Financial Studies published Wisdom of Crowds: The Value of Stock Opinions Transmitted Through Social Media. Researchers from City University of Hong Kong, Purdue University and Georgia Institute of Technology analyzed approximately 100,000 Seeking Alpha articles and commentary published between 2005 and 2012. The researchers looked at the ability of Seeking Alpha articles to predict not only future stock returns (a variable susceptible to influence by analysts' published opinions), but also future earnings surprises (a variable unlikely to be influenced by published opinions). The authors found that views expressed in Seeking Alpha articles, as well as reader commentaries on those articles, did predict future stock returns over every time-frame examined, from one month to three years. Articles and reader commentaries also predicted earning surprises.[2][15]

Reception

In 2013, Wired named Seeking Alpha one of the "core nutrients of a good data diet."[16] In 2007, Seeking Alpha received a Forbes' Best of the Web designation[17] and was selected by Kiplinger's as Best Investment Informant.[18] In 2011 Seeking Alpha Market Currents was listed as number one in Constantine von Hoffman's list of Essential Economic blogs.[19]

Allegations of market manipulation

Seeking Alpha has been alleged to be a platform for market manipulators. Given Seeking Alpha's popularity, some investors take advantage of it to manipulate the market for their benefit. To do so, they typically post highly negative news or analysis about a company and their stock, urging the readers to sell their shares and not to buy any new shares, causing a rapid decline in the stock price by the readers rushing to sell their shares. They expect that this will create a lower entry point for them to buy the stock in the near future and they will profit once their biased and misrepresented article is rebutted. Some other investors will also short the stock before they post their negative article, profiting both by the initial decline of the stock price and its subsequent near-future rise by regaining its possession at a lower price.[20]

Subscriptions

The freemium platform announced Dec. 31, 2020 that it would expand its paywall on its content. Its premium content subscription, which previously put a group of specific articles and authors behind a paywall within 7-14 days after initial publishing, would now have a monthly limit on how many articles could be read for free without a subscription.[21] Effective Jan. 4, 2021, a free user can access 5 articles a month without paying;[22] after that they would be asked to subscribe to Seeking Alpha Premium. The cost of the plan, as of Feb. 7, 2021, was $19.99 per month billed annually or $29.99 billed monthly.[23] In the Dec. 31, 2020 announcement, David Jackson, founder and CEO, and Daniel Hochman, vice president of product, wrote that "more than 70,000+ investors have already subscribed to Premium and have unlimited access to all that Seeking Alpha Premium has to offer."[24]

See also

References

  1. ^ Regan, Trish (24 March 2014). "How Social Media Can Influence Markets". Bloomberg TV. Retrieved 20 April 2014.
  2. ^ a b Hu, Yu (Jeffrey); Hailiang Chen; Prabuddha De; Byoung-Hyoun Hwang (May 2014). "Wisdom of Crowds: The Value of Stock Opinions Transmitted Through Social Media". The Review of Financial Studies. 247 (5): 1367*1403. Archived from the original on 2015-03-28. Retrieved 20 April 2014.
  3. ^ Bilton, Ricardo. "How publishers-turned-platforms pay their amateur contributors". Digiday. Retrieved 20 April 2014.
  4. ^ "Market Movers", U.S. News & World Report, March 2009. Archived 2012-10-21 at the Wayback Machine
  5. ^ Director of Contributor Relations", Seeking Alpha, January 17, 2011.
  6. ^ "An End To Our Relationship With Yahoo, A New Era For Equity Research", Seeking Alpha, January 25, 2014.
  7. ^ Hu, Yu Jeffrey; Hailiang Chen; Prabuddha De; Byoung-Hyoun Hwang (14 April 2014). "Associate Professor and Consultant". The Review of Financial Studies (RFS). 27 (5): 1367–1403. Archived from the original on 28 March 2015. Retrieved 20 April 2014.Chernova, Yuliya (19 March 2014). "Study: Crowdsourced Stock Opinions Beat Analysts, News". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 20 April 2014.
  8. ^ "About Seeking Alpha". seekingalpha.com. Seeking Alpha. Retrieved 2021-01-20.
  9. ^ "Seeking Alpha Media Kit 01/06/2021" (PDF). seekingalpha.com. Seeking Alpha. 2021-01-06. Retrieved 2021-01-20.
  10. ^ "Seeking Alpha Media Kit 01/06/2021" (PDF). seekingalpha.com. Seeking Alpha. 2021-01-06. Retrieved 2021-01-20.
  11. ^ "Article Payments". Seeking Alpha. Retrieved 2021-01-21.
  12. ^ "Updated: Seeking Alpha On Track To Pay Its Bloggers $1.2 Million This Year". paidContent. Archived from the original on 2013-10-25. Retrieved 24 October 2013.
  13. ^ "Seeking Alpha Media Kit 01/06/2021" (PDF). seekingalpha.com. Seeking Alpha. 2021-01-06. Retrieved 2021-01-20.
  14. ^ "About Seeking Alpha". seekingalpha.com. Seeking Alpha. Retrieved 2021-01-20.
  15. ^ Chernova, Yuliya. "Study: Crowdsourced Stock Opinions Beat Analysts, News". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 21 April 2014.
  16. ^ WIRED: 101 Signals
  17. ^ Forbes (December 17, 2004). "Forbes Best Of The Web". website. Archived from the original on February 15, 2012. Retrieved 27 April 2013.
  18. ^ "The 2007 Best List", Kiplinger's Personal Finance Magazine, November 2007.
  19. ^ von Hoffman, Constantine (Dec 26, 2011). "10 Essential Economic Blogs". Inc Magazine.
  20. ^ Coffee, Jr., John C.; Mitts, Joshua (March 18, 2019). "Short Selling and the New Market Manipulation". The CLS Blue Sky Blog. Columbia Law School.
  21. ^ https://seekingalpha.com/article/4396836-important-update-for-seeking-alpha-users
  22. ^ "How to Find Profitable Investing Ideas, Improve Your Portfolio with Seeking Alpha Premium | Seeking Alpha".
  23. ^ "Seeking Alpha Subscription Plan Pricing".
  24. ^ https://seekingalpha.com/article/4396836-important-update-for-seeking-alpha-users
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