Trading terminology
Ask - The lowest price sellers are willing to sell a security.
Bid - The highest price buyers are willing to pay for a security.
Bond - A bond is a fixed income instrument that represents a loan made by an investor to a borrower (typically corporate or governmental). A bond could be thought of as an I.O.U (I owe you) between the lender and borrower that includes the details of the loan and its payments. Bonds are used by companies, municipalities, states, and sovereign governments to finance projects and operations. Owners of bonds are debtholders or creditors of the issuer.
Commodities - A commodity is a basic good used in commerce that is interchangeable with other goods of the same type. Commodities are most often used as inputs in the production of other goods or services.
Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs) - An exchange-traded fund (ETF) is a type of security that tracks an index, sector, commodity, or other assets, but which can be purchased or sold on a stock exchange the same way a regular stock can. An ETF can be structured to track anything from the price of an individual commodity to a large and diverse collection of securities. ETFs can even be structured to track specific investment strategies.
Execution - Execution is the completion of a buy or sell order for a security. The execution of an order occurs when it gets filled, not when the investor places it.
Dividend Distribution - A dividend is the distribution of corporate profits to eligible shareholders. Common shareholders of dividend-paying companies are typically eligible to receive dividends as long as they own the stock before the ex-dividend date. Dividend distributions can be done in cash (cash dividend) or in units of stock (stock dividend).
Fill - A fill is an executed order. It is the action of completing or satisfying an order for a security or commodity. Order execution and reporting fill is a fundamental act in the transacting of stocks, bonds or any other type of security.
Foreign Currency Spread - The spread is the difference between the Bid price (highest price buyers are willing to pay) and the Ask price (lowest price sellers are willing to sell) of a security.
Mergers - A merger is an agreement that unites two existing companies into one new company. Mergers are a way for companies to expand their reach, expand into new segments, or gain market share.
Options - The term option refers to a financial instrument that is based on the value of underlying securities such as stocks. An options contract offers the buyer the right but not the obligation to buy or sell—depending on the type of contract they hold—the underlying asset.
Order - An order consists of instructions to a broker or brokerage firm to purchase or sell a security on an investor's behalf. An order is the fundamental trading unit of a securities market. To learn more about the different types of orders offered via the MogoTrade app, you can refer here.
Reverse Stock Split - A reverse stock split consolidates the number of existing shares of stock held by shareholders into fewer shares. A reverse stock split does not directly impact a company's value (only its stock price).
Securities - The term "security" refers to a fungible, negotiable financial instrument that holds some type of monetary value. It represents an ownership position in a publicly-traded corporation via stock; a creditor relationship with a governmental body or a corporation represented by owning that entity's bond; or rights to ownership as represented by an option.
Short Sale - It is generally a transaction in which an investor sells borrowed securities in anticipation of a price decline; the seller is then required to return an equal number of shares at some point in the future.
Stock - A stock (also known as equity) is a security that represents the ownership of a fraction of a corporation. This entitles the owner of the stock to a proportion of the corporation's assets and profits equal to how much stock they own. Units of stock are called "shares."
Stock Market - The stock market refers to the collection of markets and exchanges where regular activities of buying, selling, and issuance of shares of publicly-held companies take place. Such financial activities are conducted through institutionalized formal exchanges
Stock Split - A stock split is when a company divides the existing shares of its stock into multiple new shares to boost the stock's liquidity. Although the number of shares outstanding increases by a specific multiple, the total dollar value of the shares remains the same compared to pre-split amounts, because the split does not add any real value.