The Hulbert Financial Digest (HFD) is a premium newsletter that is made available to investors by MarketWatch. HFD was started by Mark Hulbert in the 1970s to track the performance of investment newsletters. Hulbert writes financial columns for various publications like Barron’s magazine and the New York Times. Investors read the HFD to decide which newsletters to subscribe to.

The HFD has all the information available for the reader to evaluate a newsletter’s performance. In addition to the numbers, there are graphs and tables blended with lively commentary for subscribers to gain a better understanding. The HFD has a conversational style that doesn’t distract from the highly informative and well-researched articles.

The HFD computers monitor more than 180 stock and mutual fund investment letters. There are over 500 suggested portfolios as well. The coverage starts from 1980 and this enables readers to make the right choice when it comes to newsletters by filtering which ones have made the most money over and over again.

The HFD is providing an important service for subscribers as 80 percent of investment newsletters underperform market averages.  The HFD is a reputable source as opposed to the claims made by advisory newsletters that assure investors that there money will grow considerably with little risk. Mark Hulbert tracked these newsletters and found that their recommendations were exaggerated greatly.

The last thing that investors need to do is to throw away money by following newsletters that are expensive losers. Each issue of the HFD contains comprehensive but concise reports of four newsletters that have performed the best. There are also great stock picks dished out by the HFD together with some top-performing funds.

Look for the HFD Honor Roll that identifies the top-performing newsletters over the last two decades among other things. The Performance Scorecard, Hulbert Rankings and the Market Exposure Among Market Timers chart are some of the tools that investors can use to research and study the stock market. Stock market trading success is predicated on access to accurate and timely information.

The HFD Rankings are reputable because they have been a go to source for investors for the last three decades and in 2002, MarketWatch took it over after recognizing its potential. The biggest plus point of the HFD is that it gives an unbiased analysis since it is not affiliated to the newsletters that it reviews.

There are valuable facts and figures with strategic information in each issue of the HFD. Investors will have to make use of this to pick the newsletter(s) they need to achieve their investment goals with an eye on the market conditions. The HFD is crucial in finding out which ones have a successful track record over the long-term.

The Hulbert Financial Digest has a free 30-day trial for investors to take a look at it. There are 3 Free bonuses that will come with the first HFD issue which can be kept even if the subscription is cancelled later on. The HFD Introductory Booklet is one of these and has insights on how to take full advantage of the HFD.