How to Find Historical Stock Charts

Historical Stock Charts. Name Your Date.

Perhaps you need to know what the Dow closed at the end of 1957. Or see a chart for the last time IBM split its stock shares. The date of the latest earnings report from GE? Or the price of a share of GOOG a week after its IPO? The internet puts stock history and charts at your fingertips, but you need to know which resources to use for which types of financial information. Here's how to make the best use of stock history charts.

Instructions

1. **Use BigCharts Historical for A Quick Look at a Date**

   BigCharts gives you a detailed snapshot of a stock on any date of your choosing. Just enter the stock symbol and the date, and Presto, you have your information. Find it at bigcharts.marketwatch.com/historical

2. **Use Yahoo Finance Charts For An Easy Overview of a Stock' s History**

   For detailed historical data on a stock, Yahoo Finance is a terrific tool. Just head to finance.yahoo.com, and enter the company name or symbol in the appropriate box, and press the "Get Quotes" button. This will give you a load of current information, along with a daily chart.

   For historical information, click on the "Historical Prices" link in the menu on the left hand side of the page. This will open up a new page where you can enter your search parameters.

   Specify the date range of interest (data can go back decades in many cases), and choose the button for the type of values you want: Daily, Weekly, Monthly, or Dividends Only information.

   The search will return a table of stock prices (Open, High, Low, Closing Price), and Volume (number of shares sold). There is also an Adjusted Closing Price, to account for share splits, dividends, and any other unusual adjustments.

   Note that at the bottom of the table is a link that allows you to download the data into a spreadsheet.

3. **Visit MoneyCentral for Splits, Dividends and Technical Analysis**

   For a great visual presentation of historical stock information, including splits and dividends, pay a visit to moneycentral.msn.com

   As at other sites, just enter the stock symbol to see the most recent set of information (current price, eps, P/E ratio, market capitalization, and so on).

   On the left, click the link to Historical Charts, where you can set a large number of variables to fine tune the type of data you retrieve.

   You can choose to display data for the past few days, months, a year, 5 years, or so on. Or, you can enter specific dates that you want to see on a chart.

   In the Customize Chart field you can indicate any different overlays for the graph. Under 'Technical Overlays' check off Dividends and Splits to have these two items included with the chart.

   There are also options to include Bolinger Bands, Moving Averages, Price-Limit Lines, and other technical analysis tools.

   You can also compare your stock to other stocks, or to indexes such as the Dow, S&P 500, or the Nasdaq.

   Such fun!