Billed as a "social hub" for traders, the site tracks tweets about publicly listed companies using hashtags, company names and stock trading symbols.

Users log-in using their own Twitter accounts and can post and share news, rumours and investment strategies with other participants. Members may also rate stocks and vote on those which they feel are going to increase or decrease in price the following trading day

Stocktweeting includes company listings about every public company on every US exchange, from Nasdaq down to the over-the-counter markets.

The site has been launched by Matthew Hagens of social media outfit HagensMedia.

He says: ""Twitter is an exciting emerging forum for financial discussion. We expect to release full-blown desktop and Apple iPhone applications within the next few months."

Elsewhere in the Twittersphere, the reputational risks to banks engaging with the micro-blogging site have been highlighted by Hawthorne Credit Union and Brewer FCU, which had their Twitter accounts hijacked and used to promote $300-a-day homeworking spam.

The US-based institutions fell victim to a twist on the traditional online account phishing scam by following a link posted by one of their followers and entering their account credentials at a bogus Twitter site.

As the Financial Brand blog points out: "If these guys knew they were in control of official credit union Twitter accounts, they would have sent this kind of private message to all the followers of Hawthorne and Brewer credit unions: I'm sorry to bother you but there is a small problem with your account. Please DM me as soon as you can.

"Someday very soon, financial institutions' Twitter accounts will come under direct assault by hackers deliberately looking to defraud consumers."

Acknowledging the dangers, Twitter this week introduced a "Report as Spam" button with a promise to follow up all abuse reports and shut down spam accounts.