[jyl]

If you're evaluating a stock as a long-term investment, you need to do the work to analyze the fundamental outlook for the company and the stock's valuation, and have a view on the same factors for the country's market. F is a company with a long history, in an industry with history and discernible trends. If you wanted to use a stock to learn about fundamental security analysis, it would be a pretty good one.

Security Analysis by Graham is a good book.

If you're thinking about short-term trading, that's a different story.