for questions that relate to stock markets. A stock market or equity market is a public entity for the trading of company shares.
32
votes
6answers
4k views
Why is the stock market closed on the weekend?
It's all digital and done with computers these days, so why bother? Doesn't that just make the system less liquid-able, which is the opposite to one aim of having the stock market?
Plus can't you ...
12
votes
5answers
209 views
What is the rationale behind stock markets retreating due to S&P having a negative outlook on the USA?
From a Bloomberg article published on 18/4/2011
Standard & Poor’s put a “negative” outlook on the AAA credit rating of the U.S., citing a “material risk” the nation’s leaders will fail to deal ...
11
votes
7answers
998 views
What happened when the dot com bubble burst?
The Wikipedia article on the dot-com bubble defines it as:
a speculative bubble covering roughly 1995–2000 (with a climax on
March 10, 2000 with the NASDAQ peaking at 5132.52 in intraday trading
...
7
votes
2answers
184 views
Are stock prices likely drop off a little bit on a given friday afternoon?
My friend told me this but I can't find any information about it on the internet.
His theory is that traders generally tend to close their positions on the Friday because they don't want to be ...
7
votes
5answers
230 views
Why are some long term investors so concerned about their entry price?
A long term investor is usually defined as someone who enters an investment for, say, 10, 20, 30 years or more. Generally they buy an investment to help meet a certain objective in their lives (e.g. ...
7
votes
1answer
458 views
How does a public company issue new shares without diluting the value held by existing shareholders?
When a public company issues new shares, the total number of shares traded in a secondary market goes up. Assuming there is no change in the fundamentals of the company and the profitability, I would ...
5
votes
2answers
225 views
What is the point of the stock market? What is it for, and why might someone want to trade or invest?
Sometimes you have to explain this to young people or people unfamiliar with the stock market.
Why would a company want to be a stock company?
Why would a person want to trade stocks?
How does a ...
4
votes
3answers
210 views
Why does the stock market consistently overreact to the business cycle?
It's been shown time and time again (e.g. in Stocks for the Long Run) that the most profitable time to buy stocks is when sentiment is poor and that stocks usually recover very quickly at the end of a ...
4
votes
2answers
129 views
How far into the future is a stock future? How do stock futures work?
I have been looking at the markets recently and most of the time, I see similar articles on how the market is going to do depending on how futures did. I am not that familiar with futures, but how ...
4
votes
1answer
40 views
Am I exposed to currency risk when I invest in shares of a foreign company that are listed domestically?
If a multinational firm based in country A is listed in both country A and country B, and I invest in this firm as a resident of country B through country B's stock exchange, either through something ...
3
votes
3answers
159 views
Table of how many years it takes to make a specified return on the stock market?
Suppose I want to know "if I want to make a 30% return on the stock market, how many years should I expect to wait?"
I know the real answer is "it depends - if the market does horrible it could ...
3
votes
2answers
716 views
What does “more buyers than sellers” in technical analysis of stocks actually mean?
I often hear/read technical analysts looking at volume and price action on a chart and claiming that there are "more buyers than sellers" or vice versa.
Since every trade requires a buyer and a ...
3
votes
2answers
62 views
Benjamin Graham: Minimum Size of the company
In the book "Intelligent Investor", Graham recommends a minimum annual sales figure of 100 Million $ as one of the criteria.
How do we adjust this figure for Inflation and a country other than the ...
3
votes
1answer
50 views
meaning of “differing bought and sold value of shares traded;” “money flows into vs out of” a stock
at:
http://www.avafin.com/articles/1018128.html
I see:
"Today, a total of 141 block trades were recorded, typically at least 10,000 shares of stock or more represent a single block unit. Further ...
2
votes
5answers
259 views
Can dividends be exploited?
Apple announced a dividend of $2.65/share on August 16th. I was thinking... could somebody buy, say 1,000 shares of Apple, receive the dividend, and then sell the shares right back?
...
2
votes
3answers
718 views
Is there a mathematical formula to determine a stock's price at a given time?
I have been trying to find exact information on how stock prices are determined but still I haven't found any exact mathematical formulas how it happens. Wikipedia states:
When prospective buyers ...
2
votes
1answer
141 views
What is the correlation between silver prices and stock prices?
I'm interested in the correlation (in the recent years, or even decades) between the silver (and maybe gold) prices and some stock market index. In other words, I'd like to know how strong is the ...
2
votes
2answers
74 views
Which instrument to use to trace the Aussie Stock Market?
The best way to achieve market returns is to get into a product that traces the market, right?
So I have found two such potential products to trace the ASX 200. The first is an ETF, STW.AX (SPDR 200 ...
2
votes
1answer
44 views
Conversion factor between tracker value and index value?
Where can I find what the conversion factor is between the value of a tracker and the underlying index, other than just computing it myself of course?
Is it also explained how these conversion ...
2
votes
1answer
120 views
When Employees are “Granted” Stock Options, is the Company encouraging Long-Term investments from them?
I'm not exactly sure I understand the "why" behind a Company reasoning for offering "options" to their employees to invest in itself.
I've found it is very unlikely of the employees to exercise for a ...
2
votes
1answer
146 views
Can someone explain recent AAMRQ stock price behavior to me?
I'm interested in American Airlines stock (AAMRQ). Recently they announced a merger with US Airways. The resulting company is said to be worth $11B (USD). Tom Horton, the CEO, said that after ...
2
votes
2answers
176 views
Can heavy demand for options drive up or down a stock price?
I understand the market maker is the one quite frequently on the other side of my buy or sell option order (to make sure their is liquidity in the market, and offering the bid / ask spread as ...
1
vote
1answer
56 views
What to make of historical stock market volatility?
I looked on Google Finance today at the DJIA, and kept backing up the time window until I saw the whole display they had, from 1971 until today (Oct 2011).
It seemed to me that the volatility--the ...
1
vote
2answers
486 views
2008-2009 Stock Market Crash — what caused the second drop?
During the 2008 - 2009 stock market "crash", the bottom came in early March, not in the heavy liquidity and other banking crises in the fall. Do you remember what the history of this is, what ...
1
vote
3answers
2k views
How can I trade in U.S stock exchange living in India by choosing the broker in U.S?
I would appreciate if you kindly suggest an answer for this question.Anything incomplete in this question should be assumed.
And also please suggest which is the best brokerage firm/broker for this ...
1
vote
2answers
94 views
Why do some companies have stock symbols on different markets?
How come some companies have stock symbols in different markets? Eg. if I wanna buy stocks in Nokia corporation I see they have different stocks to choose from. How do I find out the difference ...
1
vote
2answers
92 views
Explain the HSI - why do markets sometimes appear in sync and other times not?
Can someone please explain this to me: in 2006, HSI moved almost identical like indexes on the New York Stock Exchange. However, the crisis period (2007-2011) shows the deviation from the others.
My ...
1
vote
1answer
254 views
How does a change in market cap affect a company's operational decisions?
When the market capitalization of a company goes up or down, should it affect the company operational/investing decisions? Does it affect its funding ability?
I'm referring to a case where nothing ...
1
vote
2answers
1k views
Historical data files for NYSE/NASDAQ daily open/close price data?
is there a place to get free access to NYSE/NASDAQ historical daily open/close data? Perhaps going back like 10 years? I'm more interested in the DOW and NASDAQ 100 data for this range, not ...
0
votes
0answers
32 views
Stock broker's profit margin & criteria [duplicate]
Possible Duplicate:
How much do brokerages pay exchanges per trade?
What do brokerage firms do?
How much does it cost a broker to trade a company's stock on your behalf? Is it different ...
-1
votes
1answer
109 views
Getting started with trading and investing with Stock Market for novice through Investment Bank, for Indian citizen on Nasdaq,NYSE?
I want to know all the requirements(a-z) and the process involved if I want to buy shares from underwriters and the day company goes public.I know its not easy for an individual to get piece of stock ...
-1
votes
1answer
48 views
In a quote-driven market, how do market makers figure out bid/ask prices and bid/ask sizes?
I understand that bid/ask prices and bid/ask sizes are ultimately determined by the market maker. I am curious about some general principles that the market maker follows when determining the above ...
-3
votes
0answers
42 views
After an IPO, does the increase in stock price provide more money to the company? [duplicate]
Companies go public so they can raise money by a funding round. My understanding is that the IPO is for this reason. They offer a certain amount of shares and raise X amount of capital, and the share ...
