In relation to my empirical research I am interested in the following questions (regarding the US).
1) How widespread is the use of Google when invidual/private investors wants to find information on a particular firm's stock? Are there any sources documenting this?
I need to know if searching for information on a particular stock is performed using Google because I'm trying to model/forecast stock prices using search volume indexes from Google. If this is not something that individual investors do my hypothesis is wrong and I won't be able to model stock prices using this information.
2) How big is the share traded by individual/private investor to total trade in the stock market? Sources?