If you follow the markets, the economy, wall street, and various companies, you will get an idea of how business works. You will never win them all, but will win some. If you follow closely, you will see trends of certain companies, and of how they trade, giving you a point of entry or one to leave.
For Bank of America, the stock is low, and if you have a few years horizon, you will make money. Tomorrow they report quarterly earnings.
You should add up what you predict will be the earnings of the company for the next several years and discount this back to today. I'd then buy if the stock is priced 30% below the value you calculated.
BankAmerica is low enough to buy now. Unless the US economy collapses, it is likely to go higher.
High enough to sell = when you made some nice profit (don't get greedy)
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A deep philosophical question. People spend their whole lives trying to figure that out. If there were a sure-fire method to do so, everyone would be a millionaire.
BOA is one to stay away from
you do research on the companies - there is tons of free info on every company on the internet somewhere - google it