I hear that penny stocks can be a good investment. Is that true and how would I get started?

No it is not true that penny stocks are a good investment, in fact penny stocks are not recommended by any professional as an investment vehicle.

Reputable firms ARE NOT permitted by law to recommend penny stocks as an investment.

All firms "tolerate" their client buying and/or selling penny stocks but most would prefer them not to.

From a broker/dealers point of view, penny stocks are expensive to trade, clear and maintain and usually customers that trade in such stocks are for the most part not familiar with the products or the markets.

To get into penny stock, just open an account with any brokerage firm you want, deposit the firm's required deposit (usually $500) and you can begin to trade penny stocks HOWEVER unless you understand the markets and the stocks you would be foolish to invest/trade in any thing you know nothing about. Study the products and the markets before you do any investing..

You heard wrong.

Penny stocks are far riskier than other stocks. They are completely inappropriate for the novice investor.

Read the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) link below. If you do not fully understand all of these risks, avoid penny stocks.

Consider mutual funds until you gain some investing knowledge.

Great fund companies include Vanguard and Fidelity. Both offer discount brokerage services. Both have good sites and excellent customer service.

Good investment reading that should be in any decent library:

One Up On Wall Street - Peter Lynch

A Random Walk Down Wall Street - Burton Malkiel

The Intelligent Investor - Benjamin Graham

There are several risks involved in any investment. Investing in Over The Counter (OTC) or Pink Sheet (PK) stocks are highly speculative, though and have limited information available to measure out the risk vs reward.

Exchange traded stocks must provided information to investors on a regular basis such as quarterly reports and annual reports detailing earnings, insider transactions, company events, etc. The restrictions for OTC and PK stocks are very lax.

OTC and PK stocks tend to have very low volumes. You may have trouble selling shares, getting consistent pricing.

Beware of message boards or 'investment sites' extolling the virtues of the next 'it' stock. Some people are paid to pump up a stock with false or misleading information only to have the stock increase in value so current holders get out with your money and you have shares in a company with no real chance for sustainable growth.

My dad lost his shirt with one of these penny stocks.

The company had some bad news out (bankruptcy).

He tried to sell his shares, but no one was buying them.

He saw the shares go down to nothing.

You can trade these through any discount brokerage.

Do not open an account unless you have about $3,000.

Or you will just get hammered with commission trading costs, and minimum account balance fees.

You have heard wrong on several accounts:

1. For a person of your skill level...which is very little....you would not be able to tell a good penny stock from a bad one.....you might say "I can read opinion in the media!!!" and I would reply "I repeat...You cannot tell a good penny from a bad penny stock"

2. Saying that no "honest/reliable broker or firm" will sell a penny stock is laughable. A Penny stock is one by most definitions that is less than $5.00/share (though I lower that to less than $1/share personally) I can assure you that every brokerage firm will sell you stocks in the $0.01 to $5.00 / share range.

However, you are probably referring to SUB-PENNIES...less than $0.01/share and there you may find a reluctance by many firms to trade in this underworld of stock. They won't trade using the internet as they are not set up for such digital transactions. They may still do it but the order must be phoned in to them and the order would be processed the old fashioned way by phoning it in to the trading floor.....to get a faster response would require you finding a brokerage firm that specializes in dealing with this sub-culture.

If you believe pennies are high risk.....sub-pennies are not high risk...they are mostly SCAMS. It takes a special breed of trader to make money at these basement levels...they are sharks looking for fish like you to part you from your coin....with your level of expertise you would be nothing more than "chum bait"....not only do you have to learn to street fight with the pump and dump traders but you also have to fight unscrupulous company owners whose sole reason of owning these worthless companies is to SELL (NOT BUY) to fresh meat...newbies like you would be.

So if pennies are your game....it is very risky but any broker will handle your request but you have to learn a lot of skills to be successful there and American penny stocks especially are not easy....I know as I invest in Penny stocks...they make up about 1/3 of my portfolio...but they are Canadian Oil &Gas and Mining pennies...start-up companies that show promise.....BUT I have not been successful with American pennies and refuse to put money into them any more....AND I-know-what-I-am-doing....you don't.

Sub-pennies is not a game for amateurs and is a wasteland for people like you.

yeah. penny stocks are really great fruit bearers if you choose to invest in them. I have been dealing specially with the OTC US listed companies and I really earned huge profits. do any of you know anything about GALA GLOBAL INC.? if yes, please do provide more info about the company.

I think it's time to check your hearing. You are definitely hearing the wrong things, likely from the folks who hope to transfer money from your pocket to theirs.

Excellent answers from the TCs above, I have nothing more to add to their counsel.

Another lamb for the fleecing. Try it and your bank account will show you how wrong you are.