Best Online Investment Tools Options

[Timbo]

I'm partially curious what is actually available out there, be it installable programs, websites, resources, indexes, etc. What are some of your favorites that you've found particularly useful? I'd appreciate hearing what people use.

[impala454]

That software looks pretty neat, but I'm a little weary of trying something like that... It's browser based??? Reading through their about page I see a couple of things that would bother me:

Why does Mint need my bank login information (username and password)?

Mint needs this information to establish a secure connection with your bank, credit union or credit card company. This enables Mint to download and categorize your transaction information securely and automatically.

Can Mint employees view my online banking username and passwords? Do you store my bank login information on your servers?

No, Mint employees can’t view your banking username and passwords. We do not store this information at Mint. Your banking login credentials are securely stored by our online financial service providers. Your Mint login credentials are not shared with these providers.

So I enter all of my financial accounts user/pass to Mint, then they get passed on to a second company for storage. Then that company passes my user/pass on to my bank? So does this middle security company download my bank statements and send them to mint to be parsed?

I'm also reading quite a bit of other concerns like who the middleman security company is, how unsecure the "Forgot Password" function is, etc. On their forum an Admin posted this:

As described in the Terms of Use and with your consent, Mint will from time to time connect electronically to your online bank, credit card and other online financial accounts and obtain account information from those third parties (“Account Information”) in order to provide the Service to you. Mint does not at any time store or retain your online credentials, whether in the form of Login IDs, account numbers, passwords or pins for this Account Information.

Mint uses your Account Information as follows:

* to offer the Service to you;
* to deliver information relevant to your financial interests, such as savings offers from third party product and service providers (“Mint Offers”)
* to deliver administrative notices such as alerts and communications relevant to your use of the Service;
* for market research, project planning, troubleshooting problems, detecting and protecting against error, fraud or other criminal activity

That last bullet point really bothers me. I guess I'll just pass on it.

Haha sorry this post was slowly added to over the period of an hour or so