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The shares or stock sold by a company to provide start-up capital before carrying out an initial public offering (IPO).

An analyst employed by a brokerage house such as Merrill Lynch.

The date when a securities buyer must pay for a purchase or a seller must deliver the securities sold. Settlement must be made on or before the third business day following the transaction date in most cases.

A paper certificate that represents the number of shares an investor owns.

The difference between the total of assets and liabilities shown on a company’s balance sheet. Book value is the shareholders equity divided by the number of outstanding shares.

The total number of shares issued by a corporation.

This is a condition resulting from selling an option and not owning the related securities.

Selling stock you don’t own. You hope it drops in price so you can buy it back later at a lower price. You must have a margin account with your broker to sell short.

A short sale squeeze occurs when there are many short sale positions on a stock the stock begins to increase. As the stock price rises, the short sellers scramble to cover their short positions, i.e., buying the stock they have sold back. This creates demand for the stock above that which caused the stock price to start rising in the first place, and can lead to rapid price appreciation.

Trades based on signals from computer programs. These are usually entered directly from the traders computer to the market’s computer system. Program trading accounts for an increasingly larger and larger portion of all trades throughout the day. Additionally, these large trades may be hedged by an offsetting position in index futures.