Stock market course for beginners in India

What a beginner really needs to learn first

A beginner does not need a strategy first. A beginner needs a clear picture of what is happening when a price moves. A sensible order looks like this:

1. What a share is. Owning one share of a company, say a made-up "ABC Ltd", means owning a very small part of that company.
2. Why prices move. Who the buyers and sellers are, and how their orders meet.
3. How to read a price chart. Trends, sideways markets and volatile periods, before any indicators.
4. How to judge information. Telling facts apart from opinions and assumptions in news, company numbers and research.
5. How much you could lose. Position sizing, risk limits and stop-loss concepts, before committing money.
6. How your own mind behaves. Fear of missing out, overconfidence and loss aversion affect beginners and experienced people alike.

If a course jumps to "what to buy" before these, it is skipping the part that protects you.

Live online classes or videos?

Videos are good for revising an idea you already half understand. For a complete beginner, the hard part is the question you cannot put into a search box, because you do not yet know the right words. In a live class you can stop the mentor and ask. That is why MarketMind is run as live online sessions, with the mentor and the learners attending at the same time.

How the MarketMind beginner course is planned

MarketMind by Potoos Academy is made for complete beginners. There are 12 classes over 6 weeks, two each week, 2 hours each, so 24 hours in all. Classes are taught in Tamil or English, and a new batch starts every month.

Every class follows three steps: Vinoth explains an idea using an example, you work through a situation and discuss what you would do, and you ask your questions. Every session builds on the one before it.

1. Week 1, Market Literacy: The Market Game; Price & Structure.
2. Week 2, Market Intelligence: Reading Price & Trends; Market Context & Research.
3. Week 3, Capital & Risk: Capital Allocation; Risk & Position Sizing.
4. Week 4, Decision Making: Decision Lab I; Decision Lab II.
5. Week 5, Application: Thesis to Execution; Options Lab.
6. Week 6, Self Awareness & Integration: Behaviour & Psychology; Final Market Simulation.

See every session and what you will be able to do after it.

What the course will not do

It will not give you stock tips or name shares for you to buy or sell. It does not promise any returns. The aim is that, by the end, you can understand market behaviour, read price movements, evaluate information, manage risk and make more deliberate, evidence-based decisions on your own. Learning does not mean you have to trade.

Who teaches it

Your mentor is Vinoth Kumar S, based in Chennai. He has invested in the stock market since 2005, starting with his first salary. He holds an MBA and the NISM Research Analyst certification, and he built products and startups before starting Potoos to help people who invest small amounts understand how the market works.

Want to try first? Play the first two missions of the MarketMind Challenge free, with made-up companies and practice money.