Lance Walley, co-founder and former CEO of EngineYards has launched PollyTrade, a service that links Twitter with a brokerage account to trade stocks. The first version enables users submit tweets to their E-Trade account and complete transactions that can be followed on Twitter. PollyTrade is currently looking for more beta testers.
BNK Invest has launched MarketNewsVideo.com which will produce and distribute free online video about the stock markets, the economy and publicly-traded companies. The website will let subscribers sign up to alerts by company. The content will also be made available to other websites which can embed videos by company or industry.
Condé Nast's Portfolio.com will find a new home by joining forces with American City Business Journal's bizjournals.com in July. Both websites are owned by New York-based Advanced Publications. Portfolio magazine and its website had shut down in April. Bizjournals.com will have editorial oversight over Portfolio.com and will relaunch the website with a stronger industry and business focus.
Elevation Partners' Roger McNamee will be replaced by his colleague Bre Pearlman on the board of Forbes Media, according to a report from the New York Post. In doing so, the business publication will change its strategy of investing in the web to aggressive cost-cutting. In 2006, Elevation Partners invested roughly $250 million for a 40% equity stake in Forbes Media. (Disclaimer: FinancialContent, a sponsor of this blog, provides stock market data to Forbes Media.)
Minyanville Media has raised $2.2 million in a first tranche of a round of funding, according to a SEC filing uncovered by PaidContent.org.
The online investment information portal which uses animation extensively may raise as much as $13
million, "depending on a investment by a specific potential strategic
partner." (Disclaimer: FinancialContent, a sponsor of this blog, provides stock market data and business news to Minyanville Media.)
FinancialContent has acquired SocialPicks, an online community that enables members to share investment ideas. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. (Disclaimer: FinancialContent is a sponsor of this blog.)
Condé Nast has folded Portfolio magazine along with its website. After laying off most of its website staff last October, the publisher informed the remaining 85 employees of the decision to shut down last Friday. "The pressures and realities of the continuous deep economic slump have
lowered Portfolio's revenue projections below what is needed to
continue publication," Conde Nast Chief Executive Charles Townsend said
in a statement on Monday. The website itself is still running, but most of the recent posts are essentially farewells.
Worth will be relaunched as a bimonthly magazine with an overhauled design and new business model in May. The magazine will be delivered for free to 110,000 high net worth individuals. The May issue will be followed by an October/November issue in order to get feedback from readers and the market. Meanwhile, the launch of a new Worth.com website will feature exclusive content that requires a password.
Privately-held Sandow Media bought Worth from CurtCo. Media last year.
DailyFinance, a blog operated by AOL Money & Finance, has launched DailyFinance for iPhone. The free iPhone application offers real-time stock quotes from BATS exchange, tracks multiple portfolios, and delivers customizable news from over 3,000 sources and
professional-grade charting.
The Wall Street Journal has launched an iPhone application which gives readers free access to its news content, videos and podcasts. As one of the few publishers to monetize its content on the Internet succesfully, the Wall Street Journal continues to give away its content on mobile devices and to forego subscription fees from iPhone and Blackberry users.
