The whole library
7 articles
Clear filtersWhat a Stock Actually Is
A share is a legal claim on a company's assets and earnings, ranked behind everyone else with a claim. That ordering explains most of how equities behave.
How a Stock Exchange Works
An exchange is a matching engine surrounded by rules. Understanding the order book, the market maker and the auctions explains why liquidity appears and disappears at particular moments.
Order Types, and What Each One Guarantees
Every order type trades certainty of price against certainty of execution. There is no order that guarantees both, and most execution surprises come from expecting one to.
The Bid-Ask Spread
The spread is the price of immediacy, paid on every round trip. It is also the most reliable live read on how liquid a stock actually is.
Market Hours, Premarket and After-Hours
US equities trade for six and a half regular hours and many more extended ones. The extended sessions run on different rules, thinner books and prices that frequently do not survive the open.
Market Capitalization
Market cap is price multiplied by share count. It is the market's price for the whole equity, and it is the single most useful number for deciding whether two companies are comparable at all.
ETFs, Index Funds and Mutual Funds
A fund is a basket sold as one security. The differences that matter are how it trades, what decides its holdings, and what it charges.