Dead Cat Bounce

An example of a sucker’s rally, a Dead Cat Bounce is a temporary and short-lived uptrend within a prolonged decline/bear market that is followed by a continuation of prevailing downtrend.  Small rallies are frequent in downtrends, but must be taken for what they...

Covariance

A statistic that measures the relationship between the movement of two asset prices.  If two stocks are rising and falling together, they are said to have a positive covariance.  But when they move opposite of each other, the covariance is said to be negative. ...

Correlation

A statistic that measures how much two securities move in relation to each other.  It may also be used to measure the movement of a stock in relation to an index (for example, the S&P 500).  This can give investors an idea of how the stock is performing in...

Chicago Board Options Exchange

The world’s largest options exchange.  The Chicago Board Options Exchange (Cboe) was founded in 1973 with contracts focusing on individual equities, indexes, and interest rates.  It offers options on more than 2,200 companies, 22 stock indices, and 140...

Active Investing

A hands-on approach requiring an individual to act in the role of the portfolio manager.  The goal of active investing is to beat the average returns a trader would expect if they simply invested and left the investments alone.  This involves a far deeper level of...

Units of Risk

Or “R Unit,” a unit of risk is a concept used to dampen the emotional strain of measuring trading performance in dollars.  It is represented as a ratio and provides a means to compare real-world trading performance versus probable performance.  It can be...

Yield Farming

In decentralized finance (DeFi), yield farming is a process that allows a cryptocurrency holder to lock up their holdings and receive rewards from them.  Specifically, it’s a process that allows the holder to earn fixed (or variable) interest by investing their...

Volatility

A statistical measurement of the dispersion of returns for a given security or market index.  In general terms, the higher the volatility, the riskier the security.  Within securities markets, volatility is often associated with big swings in either direction.  For...

Vega

A part of a group of measurements known as the “Greeks” which are used in options pricing.  Vega is the Greek that measures an option’s sensitivity to implied volatility.  It is the change in an option’s price for a one-point change in implied...

V Bottom

A bullish pattern created by a sharp V-shaped trough.  The trough is created by investor irrationality causing a sudden price fall and a subsequent reversal of the short-term bearish movement.  Thus, a V Bottom often occurs in a bearish trend and announces a trend...