| Date
of Record |
The
date on which a shareholder must officially own shares in order to
be entitled to a dividend. |
| Day
Order |
An
order to buy or sell which, if not executed, expires at the end of
the trading day on which it was entered. |
| Day
Trading |
Establishing
and liquidating the same position or positions within one day's trading.
(see Pattern Day Trader) |
| Days
to Cover |
Calculated
as the aggregate short interest for the month divided by the average
daily share volume traded for the period between short interest settlement
dates. If days to cover is between 0 and 1, it is rounded up to 1. |
| Dealer |
An
individual or firm in the securities business who buys and sells
stocks and bonds as a principal rather than an agent. The dealer's
profit or loss is the difference between the price paid and the price
received for the same security. The dealer's confirmation must disclose
to the customer that the principal has been acted upon. The same
individual or firm may function, at different times, either as broker
or dealer. (see NASD, Specialist) |
| Debenture |
A
promissory note backed by the general credit of a company and usually
not secured by any specific collateral, such as a mortgage or property. |
| Debit
Balance |
In
a customer's margin account, that portion of the purchase price of
stock, bonds or commodities that is covered by credit extended by
the broker to the margin customer. (see Margin). |
| Debt
/ Equity Ratio |
Indicator
of financial leverage. Compares assets provided by creditors to assets
provided by shareholders. Determined by dividing long term debt by
common stockholders' equity. |
| Delayed
Opening |
The
postponement of trading of an issue on a stock exchange beyond the
normal opening of a day's trading because of market conditions that
have been judged by exchange officials to warrant such a delay. Reasons
for the delay may be an influx of either buy or sell orders, an imbalance
of buyers and sellers, or pending corporate news that requires time
for dissemination. |
| Debt
to Equity Ratio |
Long-term
debt divided by shareholders' equity, showing relationship between
long-term funds provided by creditors and funds provided by shareholders;
high ratio may indicate high risk, low ratio may indicate low risk. |
| Decile
Rank |
Performance
over time, rated on a scale of 1-10. 1 indicates that a mutual
fund's return was in the top 10 % of funds being compared, while
3 means the return was in the top 30 %. Objective Rank compares all
funds in the same investment strategy category. All Rank compares
all funds. |
| Declaration
Date |
The
date on which a firm's directors meet and announce the date and amount
of the next dividend. |
| Deferred
Taxes |
A
non-cash expense that provides a source of free cash flow. Amount
allocated during the period to cover tax liabilities that have not
yet been paid. |
| Depletion
Accounting |
Natural
resources, such as metals, oil, gas and timber, which conceivably
can be reduced to zero over the years, present a special problem
in capital management. Depletion is an accounting practice consisting
of charges against earnings based upon the amount of the asset taken
out of the total reserves in the period for which accounting is made.
A bookkeeping entry, it does not represent any cash outlay nor are
funds earmarked for that purpose. |
| Depository
Trust Company (DTC) |
A
central securities certificate depository through which members effect
security deliveries between each other via computerized bookkeeping
entries thereby reducing the physical movement of stock certificates. |
| Depreciation |
Normally,
charges against earnings to write off the cost, less salvage value,
of an asset over its estimated useful life. It is a bookkeeping entry
and does not represent any cash outlay nor are funds earmarked for
the purpose. |
| Derivative
Security |
A
financial security, such as an option, or future, whose value is
derived in part from the value and characteristics of another security,
the underlying security. |
| Difference
from S&P |
A mutual
fund's return minus the change in the Standard & Poors
500 Index for the same time period. A notation of -5.00 means
the fund return was 5 percentage points less than the gain in the
S&P, while 0.00 means that the fund and the S&P had the
same return. |
| Director |
Person
elected by shareholders, usually during an annual meeting, to serve
on the Board of Directors of a corporation. The directors appoint
the president, vice president and all other operating officers. Directors
decide, among other matters, if and when dividends shall be paid. |
| Discount |
The
amount by which a preferred stock or bond may sell below its par
value. Also used as a verb to mean "takes into account" as
the price of the stock has discounted the expected dividend cut.
(see Proxy). |
| Discretionary
Account |
An
account in which the customer gives the broker or someone else discretion
to buy and sell securities or commodities including selection, timing,
amount, and price to be paid or received. |
| Distribution
Date |
Date
on which the payout of realized capital gains on securities in the
fund portfolio occurred. |
| Distributions |
Payments
from fund or corporate cash flow. May include dividends from earnings,
capital gains from sale of portfolio holdings and return of capital.
Fund distributions can be made by check or by investing in additional
shares. Funds are required to distribute capital gains (if any) to
shareholders at least once per year. Some Corporations offer Dividend
Reinvestment Plans (DRP). |
| Divergance |
When
two or more averages or indices fail to show confirming trends. (see Convergance) |
| Diversification |
The
acquisition of a group of assets in which returns on the assets are
not directly related over time. Proper investment diversification
is intended to reduce the risk inherent in particular securities.
An investor seeking diversification for a securities portfolio would
purchase securities of firms that are not similarly affected by the
same variables. For example, an investor would not want to combine
large investment positions in the transportation sector alone because
each industry within the sector is significantly affected by oil
prices and interest rates. |
| Dividend |
The
payment designated by the Board of Directors to be distributed pro
rata among the shares outstanding. For preferred shares, the dividend
is usually a fixed amount. For common shares, the dividend varies
with the fortunes of the company and the amount of cash on hand,
and may be omitted if business is poor or if the directors determine
to withhold earnings to invest in plants and equipment. Sometimes
a company will pay a dividend out of past earnings even if it is
not currently operating at a profit. |
| Dividend
Re-Investment Plan (DRP) |
A
program offered by companies that allow investors to buy their stock
directly from the company, without using a brokerage firm. DRP allows
investors to use their dividends to purchase additional shares of
stock in the company. |
| Dollar
Cost Averaging |
A
system of buying securities at regular intervals with a fixed dollar
amount. Under this system investors buy by the dollars' worth rather
than by the number of shares. If each investment is of the same number
of dollars, payments buy more shares when the price is low and fewer
when it rises. Thus temporary downswings in price benefit investors
if they continue periodic purchases in both good times and bad and
the price at which the shares are sold is more than their average
cost. (see Formula Investing). |
| Dow
Jones Industrial Average - DJIA |
The
Dow Jones Industrial Average index - (DJIA) is a price-weighted average
of 30 actively traded blue chip stocks, primarily industrials but
including American Express Co. and American Telephone and Telegraph
Co. Prepared and published by Dow Jones & Co., it is the oldest
and most widely quoted of all the market indicators. The components,
which change from time to time, represent between 15% and 20% of
the market value of NYSE stocks. The DJIA is calculated by adding
the closing prices of the component stocks and using a divisor that
is adjusted for splits and stock dividends equal to 10% or more of
the market value of an issue as well as substitutions and mergers.
The average is quoted in points, not in dollars. |
| Dow
Theory |
A
theory of market analysis based upon the performance of the Dow Jones
industrial and transportation stock price averages. The Theory says
that the market is in a basic upward trend if one of these averages
advances above a previous important high, accompanied or followed
by a similar advance in the other. When the averages both dip below
previous important lows, this is regarded as confirmation of a downward
trend. |
| Down
Tick |
A
down tick, or "minus" tick is a term used to designate
a transaction made at a price lower than the preceding trade. To
indicate a down tick, a minus sign is usually displayed next to the
last price of a stock. (see Up
Tick) |
| Downgrade |
A
classic negative change in ratings for a stock, and or other Analyst rated
security. (see Upgrade) |
