Month: September 2020

Real rate of return is the annual percentage of profit earned on an investment, adjusted for inflation. Therefore, the real rate of return accurately indicates the actual purchasing power of a given amount of money over time.

Industry life cycle analysis is part of fundamental analysis of a company involving the examination of the stage an industry is in at a given point in time. There are four stages in an industry life cycle: expansion, peak, contraction, trough. An analyst will determine where a company sits in the cycle and use this information to project future financial performance and estimate forward valuations (e.g., forward price-earnings ratios).

A go-shop period is a provision that allows a public company to seek out competing offers even after it has already received a firm purchase offer. The original offer then functions as a floor for possible better offers. The duration of a go-shop period is usually about one to two months.

A horizontal market is diversified so that the products created are able to meet the needs of more than one industry. A horizontal market is one in which the output good or service is widely used and in wide demand, thus the producers bear little risk in demand for their output, however will typically face a great amount of competition within the industry.

A stock symbol is a unique series of letters assigned to a security for trading purposes. New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and American Stock Exchange (AMEX) listed stocks have three characters or less. Nasdaq-listed securities have four or five characters.

Break-even price is the amount of money, or change in value, for which an asset must be sold to cover the costs of acquiring and owning it. It can also refer to the amount of money for which a product or service must be sold to cover the costs of manufacturing or providing it. In options trading, the break-even price is the stock price at which investors can choose to exercise or dispose of the contract without incurring a loss.

Demand theory is an economic principle relating to the relationship between consumer demand for goods and services and their prices in the market. Demand theory forms the basis for the demand curve, which relates consumer desire to the amount of goods available. As more of a good or service is available, demand drops and so does the equilibrium price.

A total return swap is a swap agreement in which one party makes payments based on a set rate, either fixed or variable, while the other party makes payments based on the return of an underlying asset, which includes both the income it generates and any capital gains. In total return swaps, the underlying asset, referred to as the reference asset, is usually an equity index, a basket of loans, or bonds. The asset is owned by the party receiving the set rate payment.

Tit for tat is a game-theory strategy subject to a payoff matrix like that of a prisoner’s dilemma. Tit for tat was introduced by Anatol Rapoport, who developed a strategy in which each participant in an iterated prisoner’s dilemma follows a course of action consistent with his opponent’s previous turn. For example, if provoked, a player subsequently responds with retaliation; if unprovoked, the player cooperates.

Demand theory is an economic principle relating to the relationship between consumer demand for goods and services and their prices in the market. Demand theory forms the basis for the demand curve, which relates consumer desire to the amount of goods available. As more of a good or service is available, demand drops and so does the equilibrium price.