March 21 (Bloomberg) -- Google Inc., the most-used Internet search engine, is adding a finance site to its stable of offerings, a move that sparks fresh competition for Microsoft Corp. and Yahoo! Inc.
Google Finance lets users search for stocks and mutual funds and displays company information, news stories and interactive charts. Users can also track the performance of stocks they own, said Katie Jacobs-Stanton, a Google senior product manager.
The site opens a new front in Google's battle with Microsoft and Yahoo, operators of the two most-popular financial Web sites in the U.S. Mountain View, California-based Google is adding new sites including maps and news to lure users away from competitors and sell more advertising. A fourth of U.S. Internet users access finance sites, according to researcher ComScore Networks Inc.
``We polled our users and asked where we can add value,'' Jacobs-Stanton said yesterday in an interview. ``The two things were maps and finance.''
Google Finance offers interactive charts annotated with news stories to help investors decide why stocks are rising or falling, Jacobs-Stanton said. Users can scroll through a stock's history chart by clicking and dragging their mouse, she said.
Microsoft, the world's largest software company, and Yahoo, the most-visited Internet site, make money from their finance Web sites by showing ads from companies including Fidelity Investments and Scottrade. Google doesn't plan to show ads at first, although they may be added in the future, spokeswoman Sonya Boralv said.
Top Finance Site
Microsoft's MSN Money is the most popular finance site in the U.S. Visitors to MSN Money rose 10 percent to 11.6 million in February, Reston, Virginia-based ComScore said. Visitors to Yahoo Finance, the No. 2 site, fell 16 percent to 8.68 million.
Shares of Google gained $8.40 to $348.19 yesterday in Nasdaq Stock Market composite trading. They've lost 16 percent this year.
Stock prices on Google Finance are delayed by 15 minutes for the Nasdaq Stock Market and 20 minutes for the New York Stock Exchange, Jacobs-Stanton said. Yahoo's quotes are also delayed, although users can buy real time quotes from $10.95 a month. MSN users get a limited number of free real-time quotes each day, according to Microsoft's Web site.
Google's site also shows information including company revenue, margins, contact information and executive profiles. Google buys the information from suppliers including Reuters Group PLC, Morningstar Inc., Dun & Bradstreet Corp's Hoovers Inc. and Revere Data LLC.
Google News
News stories on the finance site are compiled from Google News, which collects stories from sites across the Web. Google isn't offering its own unique content, Jacobs-Stanton said. Yahoo, by contrast, offers columns by writers including TV personality Suze Orman.
Google's ventures beyond Internet search, such as news and maps, haven't consistently become among the most popular on the Web. Google's maps site, launched in 2005, is now the third-most popular mapping site, according to ComScore. Google News, begun in 2002, isn't among the top 10 Internet news sites.
Until now, users typing a stock ticker such as ``GOOG'' into a Google home page were presented with a chart and price information, as well as links to pages from Yahoo, Microsoft, Motley Fool and ClearStation, a unit of E*Trade Financial Corp. Today, the results will include a link to Google Finance.
The site is also available at http://finance.google.com .
Google Finance is initially targeted at investors in North America. Google intends to add international versions in the future, Jacobs-Stanton said.
Users can also view articles on Web logs, or personal online journals, related to companies they are interested in, as well as message boards. The boards, which use software from Google's Groups site, are monitored by editors to remove junk material, Jacobs-Stanton said. Users can also give ratings to messages.
Bloomberg LP, the owner of Bloomberg News, competes with Reuters in providing news, data and trading systems to the financial-services industry.
To contact the reporter on this story: Jonathan Thaw in San Francisco at jthaw@bloomberg.net.
