The lexicon
Our market notes are written for people who follow markets without working in them. When a note needs a technical word, the word is underlined and links here, to one page that explains it in plain language, with a real example and the mistake people usually make with it.
Company accounts
What a company keeps out of every 100 dollars of sales once it has paid what the product costs to make.
What a company keeps out of every 100 dollars of sales once it has paid everything needed to run the business, not just to make the product.
The forecast a company publishes about its own next quarter, before the quarter has happened.
A company’s own three-month accounting period, which does not necessarily line up with the calendar.
Markets
One hundredth of one percent. A hundred basis points make one percent.
A pattern that repeats at the same time of year, such as a retailer selling more in December.
How much a price swings around, up and down, over a given period.
The worst fall from a peak to a trough over a period, that is the most an investor would have been down at the low point.
Statistics and method
The range within which the true answer probably lies, given that you only measured a sample rather than everything.
How many observations a statistic is built on.
Testing many possibilities and reporting only the ones that worked, which manufactures apparent winners out of pure chance.
Economics
The interest rate a central bank sets, which cascades into the rates paid by everyone else.
Inflation measured with food and energy stripped out, because those two swing violently for reasons monetary policy cannot touch.
The monthly count of jobs added or lost across the United States, excluding farm work, published by a government statistical agency.