Fundamental Analysis: Overview, Principles, Types

What Is Fundamental Analysis?

By Kristi Waterworth – Updated Oct 13, 2025 at 7:26 PM | Fact-checked by Frank Bass

Key Points

Fundamental analysis studies financial and macroeconomic data to assess stock value.
It includes both quantitative (numerals) and qualitative (industry status, economy) aspects.
Long-term focus and intrinsic value calculation are core to the fundamental analysis approach.

When you're considering a new investment or just deciding whether you should sell an old one, it's important to perform fundamental analysis. This is not a complicated process, but it is an important one. It will enable you to really understand what your stock is doing, why it's doing that, and whether it makes sense to buy, sell, or hold at that time.

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A notebook with a pen lying across it opened to a page that says focus on the long term. — Image source: Getty Images.

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About the Author

Kristi Waterworth has been a contributing real estate and financial expert at The Motley Fool, covering real estate, investing, and personal finance topics, since 2020. Kristi has been interviewed by various TV media outlets and podcasts for her real estate investing expertise – from residential real estate to digital real estate and everything in between. Kristi’s journalist career spans over 25 years, and she has written about real estate investing, homeownership, and home construction specifically for the last decade. She was also previously a licensed Realtor and general building contractor before the Great Recession and housing market collapse. She holds a bachelor’s degree in American history from Columbia College in Missouri.

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