  We introduce StockBabble, a conversational agent designed to support
understanding and engagement with the stock market. StockBabble's value and
novelty is in its ability to empower retail investors -- many of which may be
new to investing -- and supplement their informational needs using a
user-friendly agent. Users have the ability to query information on companies
to retrieve a general and financial overview of a stock, including accessing
the latest news and trading recommendations. They can also request charts which
contain live prices and technical investment indicators, and add shares to a
personal portfolio to allow performance monitoring over time. To evaluate our
agent's potential, we conducted a user study with 15 participants. In total,
73% (11/15) of respondents said that they felt more confident in investing
after using StockBabble, and all 15 would consider recommending it to others.
These results are encouraging and suggest a wider appeal for such agents.
Moreover, we believe this research can help to inform the design and
development of future intelligent, financial personal assistants.
