| Managment
/ Closely Held Shares |
Percentage
of shares held by persons closely related to a company, as defined
by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Part of these percentages
often is included in Institutional Holdings - making the combined
total of these percentages over 100. There is overlap as institutions
sometimes acquire enough stock to be considered by the SEC to be
closely allied to the company. |
| Manipulation |
An
illegal operation. Buying or selling a security for the purpose of
creating false or misleading appearance of active trading or for
the purpose of raising or depressing the price to induce purchase
or sale by others. |
| Margin |
The
amount paid by the customer when using a broker's credit to buy or
sell a security. Under Federal Reserve regulations, the initial margin
required since 1934 has ranged from 40% of the purchase price up
to 100%. Since 1974 the current rate of 50% has been in effect. (see Brokers'
Loans, Equity) |
| Margin
Call |
A
demand upon a customer to put up money or securities with the broker.
The call is made when a purchase is made; also if a customer's equity
in a margin account declines below a minimum standard set by the
Exchange or by the firm. |
| Market
Capitalization (MCAP) |
Price
per share multiplied by the total number of shares outstanding; also
the market's total valuation of a public company. |
| Market
Category |
The
market a security trades on, for Nasdaq either National Market(NM)
or Nasdaq SmallCap Market (SCM). |
| Market
Close Date |
Date
on which the closing Net
Asset Value (NAV) was last calculated. |
| Market
Cycle |
The
period between the 2 latest highs or lows of the S&P 500, showing
net performance of a fund through both an up and a down market. A
market cycle is complete when the S&P is 15 % below the highest
point or 15 % above the lowest point (ending a down market). The
dates of the last market cycle are: 12/04/87 to 10/11/90 (low to
low). |
| Market
Makers |
The
NASD member firms that use their own capital, research, retail and/or
systems resources to represent a stock and compete with each other
to buy and sell the stocks they represent. There are over 500 member
firms that act as Nasdaq Market Makers. One of the major differences
between The Nasdaq Stock Market and other major markets in the U.S.
is Nasdaq's structure of competing Market Makers. Each Market Maker
competes for customer order flow by displaying buy and sell quotations
for a guaranteed number of shares. Once an order is received, the
Market Maker will immediately purchase for or sell from its own inventory,
or seek the other side of the trade until it is executed, often in
a matter of seconds. |
| Market
Maker Spread |
The
difference between the price at which a Market Maker is willing to
buy a security and the price at which the firm is willing to sell
it i.e., the difference between a Market Maker's bid and ask for
a given security. Since each Market Maker positions itself to either
buy or sell inventory at any given time, each individual Market Maker
spread is not indicative of the market as a whole. (see Inside
Market) |
| Market
Order |
An
order to buy or sell at the best price currently available on the
Trading Floor. |
| Market
Price |
The
last reported price at which the stock or bond sold, or the current
quote. (see Quote) |
| Material
News |
News
released by a public corporation that might reasonably be expected
to affect the value of a corporation's securities or influence investors
decisions. Material news includes information regarding corporate
events of an unusual and non-recurring nature, news of tender offers,
unusually good or bad earnings reports, and a stock split or stock
dividend. (see Trading
Halt) |
| Maturity
Date |
The
date that a bond comes due and must be paid off. |
| Mean |
The
mathematical average of a range of numbers (calculated by dividing
the sum total of all the items in the range by the total number of
items in the range). |
| Median |
The
middle number in a defined distribution; when looking at estimates,
median refers to the estimate above and below which lie an equal
number of estimates for the period indicated. |
| Merger |
Combination
of two or more corporations. |
| Money
Market Account |
An
account in which your money is reinvested in short-term securities
by the bank or investment firm managing the account. |
| Money
Market Fund |
Open-ended
mutual fund that invests in commercial paper, banker's acceptances,
repurchase agreements, government securities, certificates of deposit,
and other highly liquid and safe securities, and pays money market
rates of interest. The fund's net asset value remains a constant
$1 a share, only the interest rate goes up or down. (see Certificate
of Deposit, Commercial
Paper) |
| Mortgage
Bond |
A
bond secured by a mortgage on a property. The value of the property
may or may not equal the value of the bond issued against it. (see Bond, Debenture) |
| Moving
Average |
Used
in charts and technical analysis, the average of security or commodity
prices constructed in a period as short as a few days or as long
as several years and showing trends for the latest interval. As each
new variable is included in calculating the average, the last variable
of the series is deleted. |
| Municipal
Bond |
A
bond issued by a county, city, district or authority. |
| Mutual
Fund |
Fund
operated by an investment company that raises money from shareholders
and invests it in stocks, bonds, options, commodities or money market
securities. (see Investment
Company) |
