Sam's Blog: How to Keep Track of Stocks With MS Excel

How to Keep Track of Stocks With MS Excel: With Microsoft Excel and Internet access you can track real time changes in the stock market. Using a feature called "Smart Tags", first introduced in MS Excel 07, you can keep track of one or more favorite stocks.

Edit Steps

Open an Excel workbook and 'Save As', giving it a name of your choice.
Click on the 'Office Button' at the top left corner of the application. Click on 'Excel Options'
In the left pane of the 'Excel Options' window click the 'Proofing' button. 'Click AutoCorrect Options...' button in the pane that opens.
Click the 'Smart Tags' tab in the AutoCorrect window. Make sure the 'Label data with smart tags' box is checked, then check 'Financial Symbol (Smart tag lists)' box, and select 'Ok' on both windows to get back to the worksheet.
Enter the symbol of the stock you are interested in and click enter. Notice the notification indicator in the lower right corner of the cell where you added your stocks symbol.
Hover over the cell and click on the down arrow on the information tag that pops out. Then click on 'Insert refreshable stock price...'
Tick the radio box to choose to have the information displayed on a new sheet or starting at a chosen cell on the same worksheet.
Enter the symbol of more stocks that you may be interested in and repeat the process.

Change the default fill and text colors to make your output easier to read and more pleasing to look at. The possibilities are endless.
It may be easier to add and delete stocks by having each output to its own worksheet.

Editing MS Excel can be addictive. You may even be tempted to write your own "how to" about one or more of your favorite things to do in Excel.