when people talk about equities they are usually speaking about owning shares in a company for companies to expand and meet their objectives they often resort to selling slices of ownership in exchange for cash to the general public buying these shares represents a great way to profit from the success of a company 
there are two ways to make money from investing in companies the market can be volatile though share prices are known to fluctuate and some companies may even go bust commodities are basic goods that can be transformed into other goods and services examples include metals energy resources and agricultural goods commodities are crucial to the economy and in some cases are viewed as a good hedge against inflation their return is based on supply and demand dynamics rather than profitability many investors invest indirectly in commodities by buying shares in companies that produce them however there is also a huge market for investing directly whether that is actually buying a physical commodity with the view of eventually selling it for a profit or investing in futures each asset class carries a different level of risk and return and tends to perform differently in a given environment alternative asset classesequities stocks bonds fixed income securities cash or marketable securities and commodities are the most liquid asset classes and therefore the most quoted asset classes there are also alternative asset classes such as real estate and valuable inventory such as artwork stamps and other tradable collectibles some analysts also refer to an investment in hedge funds venture capital crowdsourcing or cryptocurrencies as examples of alternative investments that said an asset s illiquidity does not speak to its return potential it only means that it may take more time to find a buyer to convert the asset to cash asset class and investing strategyinvestors looking for alpha employ investment strategies focused on achieving alpha returns investment strategies can be tied to growth value income or a variety of other factors that help to identify and categorize investment options according to a specific set of criteria some analysts link criteria to performance and or valuation metrics such as earnings per share eps growth or the price to earnings p e ratio other analysts are less concerned with performance and more concerned with the asset type or class investors are often advised not to put all their eggs into one basket and invest in different asset classes to spread their bets and reduce risk 