I'm just curious, are they just the same?
I in a way they are. You buy altcoins when they are low and wait for the price to spike for the right time to sell them. It's pretty much buy low sell high concept. It's just that for stocks, it usually takes longer and is more passive while for bitcoin you can trade aggressively. And I think stocks is more stable and safe as you can purchase parts of large and established businesses and corporations.
In a way they are? The only common thing they have is they buying process, you give money for "something", after that everything is completely different. I don`t think buying stocks is easy and simple like buying bitcoins is. Bitcoin is currency and we can do many things with bitcoin, bitcoin have altcoins, that altcoin market is similar with stock market. You are looking for good coin that have future, like you are looking for company with decent reputation and potential to develop more in the future. In both of them, sources of informations are essential to have, and without reliable source and analytic mind you cant be trader and make profit on altcoin or stock market.