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Abu Yahya's definitions

in the money

(FINANCE) when a financial derivative has intrinsic value to the person who holds it. There are two examples:

* when the strike price of a call option is less than the spot price of the underlying stock, it is worthwhile to exercise it;

* when the strike price of a put option is more than the spot price of the underlying stock, it is worthwhile to exercise it.

Please remember that an option being "in the money" does not mean it was a good investment. You might have bought the option when the difference between the strike price and the spot price was MORE than it is now. If it's expiring, you might as well exercise it because to not do so is just throwing money away. But it still could have been a loss for the investor.
PHIL: Sweet! My call options are back in the money. Now I'd better exercise them.

MIGUEL: You must be rolling in the cash, Holmes!

PHIL: Not even close. The forex rate for the UK pound nosedived and I got hosed pretty bad. It's not where it was when I bought these rat droppings, but I need to get out before they expire.

MIGUEL: You know, when you first told me about options they sounded like a sweet deal, but...

PHIL: Yeah... the guy who wrote the option always seems to know what's going down better than us dilettantes.
by Abu Yahya April 15, 2010
mugGet the in the moneymug.

liquidity crisis

(ECONOMICS) An emergency in which a financial or government institution cannot meet its current obligations in an acceptable form of payment. Different from insolvency, which is where that same institution cannot be realistically expected to EVER meet its obligations.

A good example of the difference is a run on a bank, especially in the days before deposit insurance. A perfectly honest, well-run bank could have all of its books in order, and be paying its depositors in legal tender, when suddenly a panic strikes and everyone wants their deposits all at once. This is necessarily impossible, and forces the bank's officers to default on their debts.

Often, the bank could resume operation later when it was established that it held performing assets greater than deposits. More recently, liquidity crises have been a problem suffered by countries facing capital flight
In 1997, several countries in East Asia were stricken with a liquidity crisis. In many cases, such as Malaysia, the panicked response had nothing whatever to do with fundamentals; it was sheer herd mentality.
by Abu Yahya May 5, 2010
mugGet the liquidity crisismug.

Bureau of Labor Statistics

(US GOVERNMENT) bureau within the federal government of the United States; part of the Department of Labor. Measures unemployment, hours worked, hourly wages, inflation, productivity, and so on.

The Department of Labor was created as a result of the NLRA (1935), which gave workers the right to organize.
Yesterday the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) published its monthly report of hours worked. This revealed that, while employees are working more hours, unemployment has not declined and wages continue to decline.
by Abu Yahya July 15, 2010
mugGet the Bureau of Labor Statisticsmug.

Eurostat

(EU GOVERNMENT) agency of the European Union that publishes harmonized statistics for the 27 member states of the EU. The EU does not collect the statistics, but reviews and edits statistics collected by its member states so that the data is comparable for all of the countries in it.
BILL: I'm blogging about the economy of Europe, but I don't know what the economic indicators are. You know, the unemployment rate, the inflation rate, hours worked, and so on.

ANNA: Go to the Eurostat web page. It's really awesome!
by Abu Yahya July 15, 2010
mugGet the Eurostatmug.

prime rate

(ECONOMICS) the lowest interest rate available to non-financial borrowers.

Banks can borrow money from the Federal Reserve System or each other at the lower federal funds rate--and they borrow money from depositors at lower rates still.
The most widely-quoted estimate of the prime rate is that published by the Wall Street Journal (from a survey of the 30 largest banks).
by Abu Yahya September 6, 2010
mugGet the prime ratemug.

balance of payments

the sum of the capital account balance and the current account balance; put another way, the net change in financial reserves of a country, whether in the form of income (current account) or foreign investments (capital account)


For example, in all years since 1980, the USA has run a large-to-huge current account deficit, but in most years it has run a capital account surplus that is almost as big as the current account deficit. As a result, the USA has run a medium-to-large balance of payments deficit over this period.

A commonly-overlooked byproduct of BoP is that it determines whether or not a currency can be used as an international reserve currency. Despite repeated efforts by the governments of the EU and Japan to get their currencies established as such, they have failed to dent the US dollar's global primacy as the money for international transactions. This is because EU member states and Japan (as well as other major economies) run very large surpluses in their BoP. Japan, in particular, imports extremely little, and retains huge reserves rather than invest all of its net export earnings overseas. As a consequence, overseas holdings of euros or yen are much to small to serve as an alternative to the US dollar.
Since the oil embargo of the 1970's, the US has run a balance of payments deficit because its trade deficit was enormous; prior to the embargo, the US BoP deficit was large because the US exported such an enormous amount of finance capital. As a consequence, the balance of payments deficit has persisted since the end of the Korean War (1953).
by Abu Yahya February 14, 2009
mugGet the balance of paymentsmug.

Initial Public Offering

(FINANCE) when a corporation "goes public"; the first sale of stock by a corporation. All sales of stock or bonds on the stock market require the services of an underwriter, or investment bank. Outside of the USA and China, it is common for regular banks to offer underwriting for corporations.

Incorporation is a legal status that allows (but by no means requires) a firm to issue stock. Moreover, once a corporation lists stock, it does not necessarily do so on a major exchange. Some corporations areclosely held, which means they have a small number of shareholders who are mostly affiliated with management; other corporations are "private," which means they have no stock issues at all, and control/shares of profits are determined contractually.

Some corporations have issues of stock, and that stock is traded, but it is not listed. Instead, it is traded on the "pink pages." Such companies are usually in a bad way, but not necessarily.

An IPO is the first issue of stock by a corporation THAT DOESN'T ALREADY have a listed stock. If a company is "taken private" (i.e., bought out by a PE fund and de-listed) then it can have another IPO (or "sponsored IPO"). Most likely, however, if a listed company will need to raise money on the stock market, it will have a "follow-on offering."
A fantasy of many entrepreneurs is "going public" with a big initial public offering, and retiring to a beachfront mansion.
by Abu Yahya September 2, 2010
mugGet the Initial Public Offeringmug.

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