The key to understanding the derivatives market is knowing that these investment products are just what they say they are: derivative.
There’s lot of specialist language in the financial markets: indices, IPOs, forex, bonds and annuities, for example. Here, we bust some of the jargon. Stay with it – it’s easier than you might think.
Bull and bear markets can reflect the optimism and pessimism of the economy but markets can also run counter to the economic data. They can rise – be bullish – when pessimism dictates they should fall and fall – be bearish – when optimism says they should rise.
A headline gross domestic product (GDP) gives a reading of basic economic health – or sickness. But you need to press and prod in the right places to get a full picture of what’s working and what’s failing.
The news, what's happening right now, is as important to the investor as technical charts and historical market data. Company news, economic news, political news.
Privately held companies can be valued by peer-group comparisons with similar stock-exchange listed firms and through cash-flow analysis.
You’re ready to add bonds to your investment portfolio because it provides income, and/or as a means to preserve capital. Sound like you? If so, avoid these four common mistakes:
Hypothesis testing is an instrument in the financial market trader's toolbox to help guide investment strategy by statistical means. The use of charts and historical data is commonplace, but the use of statistical mathematics is rare among private investors.
Anecdotal evidence from the investment banking industry suggests that 70% of all mergers and acquisitions (M&A) fail and destroy value, sometimes spectacularly.
Can the old style industrial engineering metal bashing companies become more flexible like their smaller component makers?
Are cryptocurrencies the future of international financial transactions? Can they be traded? Will the supermarket shopper use a digital currency to buy their groceries any time soon? To answer those questions, it’s necessary to look at exactly what a cryptocurrency is.
Employee stock options are schemes to enable workers to buy stakes in the companies they work for. They can be an effective way of rewarding, retaining and incentivising staff, and were historically seen as a highly desirable staff benefit.
Program trading – the computerised exchange of vast sums of assets – has champions and critics in equal measure
Short selling and buying put options can be used to profit from falling share prices. But what differentiates the two approaches and how do they stack up against each other?
Deflation fires off a tonne of things central bankers don’t want in a grown-up economy
