The Marcus Today Stock Market Dictionary

There are a lot of things in the share market that say one thing but mean another.

Brokerspeak

• I’m a broker – I didn’t cut it as a landscape gardener or personal trainer.
• The market always goes up – I am a first-year paraplanner.
• Can I put you on to one of my colleagues? – You sound like a pain in the arse.
• I’ll call you – Don’t call me.
• I’ll call you – This is possibly the last communication we will ever have.
• I’ll call you right back – Sounds like you might deal, I will call you right back.
• Time to take profits – I haven’t dealt yet today.
• Sell half, keep half – I have no idea but I could do with an order.
• It’ll be alright in the end – It was a terrible recommendation.
• Our favourite holding period is forever – I refuse to admit I’m wrong.
• If you never sell, you never make a loss – I’m an idiot.
• He’s a great analyst – His last recommendation went up.
• Average down – It’s a disaster.
• Average down – I know absolutely nothing about technical analysis.
• Buy at the bottom and sell at the top – I have no financial training.
• Buy when others are fearful – I have no financial training.
• Sell when others are greedy – I have no financial training.
• Invest in businesses, not share prices – I have never bought or sold a share in my life.
• The market is a popularity contest in the short term and a weighing machine in the long term – My value add is to quote Buffett.
• You can’t time the market – I can’t time the market.
• We are forecasting a 9% rise in the All Ords index by the end of December – That’s what I was told to say if anyone ever asked me.

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CFDs

• You can start with only $10,000 – And after you lose that trading CFDs, you can put in another $10,000.
• Trade forex from the comfort of your mobile phone – You are about to get royally rooted.
• Come to our free seminar – Come and be told nothing whilst you’re sold something.
• Two-day live trading seminar – We are going to charge you $2,000 to learn how to use our trading platform.

Financial Planning

• Compound that at 12.5% per annum and you double your money every six years – I’m a salesman.
• We recommend a long-term buy-and-hold strategy – We want to take an annual fee and never hear from you again.
• What you need is a diversified portfolio – I have absolutely no value to add when it comes to stock selection.
• We take a balanced approach – Your losses will balance out your gains.
• We’ll start by doing a financial plan – For $15,000, you tell us everything about yourself and we’ll put it all in a PowerPoint presentation, taking two hours to tell you what you told us.
• We recommend a conservative approach – We are really keen that we don’t get sued for recommending anything.
• We will manage your investments for you using ten to twenty managed funds – You know you really could be doing this online if you had half a brain.
• Click to execute Docusign email – You are about to click three times and commit yourself to years of paying 3-5% of your assets to us, just to get you an average return.

Recommendations

• Buy – We are hoping they pick us to do their next corporate deal.
• Buy – It’s a large listed stock.
• Hold – For compliance purposes, we are paying a third party for white-label research that is paranoid about saying anything that might cause anyone to trade.
• Hold – It’s a sell, but we’re not about to ruin years of relationship building between the corporate department and the company by saying sell.
• Oversold – They’re a terrible company, we’re their broker, they need cash and we need the share price up for the annual capital raising.
• Overbought – We said sell it and it kept going up. Sorry.
• Speculative buy – We recently handled a capital raising for this appalling company.
• High-risk buy – We are not responsible for your losses when you buy this corporate client on our recommendation.
• We are moving from buy to hold – Sell.
• We are moving from hold to underperform – Sell.
• It’s a conviction buy – No one takes any notice of my buy recommendations.
• It’s a high-conviction buy – No one takes any notice of my conviction buy recommendations.
• It’s a high-conviction sell – We lost out to UBS in the beauty parade to handle their recent capital raising.
• Crowded trade – Something an international arbitrage trader once said that sounded clever, so now we use it to make us sound like international arbitrage traders but all we’re doing is small-time domestic Australian equities.

Company Speak

• We have had an independent valuation done – We have paid someone to tell you our company is worth more than it is using wild assumptions.
• The independent expert says the offer is fair and reasonable – The directors’ options will be worth a fortune if this deal goes through.
• We have extended our bid – We’re clearly not paying enough yet.
• We have done a private placement – We have just given a load of discounted stock to our mates.
• The balance of the proceeds will be used for working capital purposes – Aston Martin has just launched the new DB9.
• The capital raising is for working capital purposes – It’s our annual grab for cash, which allows me to bung my non-executive brother-in-law $30,000 per annum and continue paying myself $200,000 per annum and cover the listing fees for another year.
• Our project in Myanmar is progressing towards an interim investment decision – We are a bunch of ex-brokers doing absolutely nothing in Brighton other than taking a salary from this waste of time listed company that issues shares at a discount through a private placement once a year to pay our salaries and non-executive director fees.
• The AGM resolutions were passed – We’ve issued ourselves another huge lump of options. Thanks for not turning up.
• We are facing challenging conditions (from a big four bank) – We are raking it in, pumping our customers and have just announced another record profit, we just don’t want all those lefties bleating about a big bank tax again.
• Unseasonal weather patterns have impacted first-half profit – We have no excuse.

Client Language

• I am a value investor – I never sell.
• I am a trader – I can’t be arsed doing any fundamental analysis.
• I’ve never traded options before, but I need to deal today – I’ve got some inside information.
• Thought I’d ring – You haven’t called me in three years despite me paying you a retainer.
• I’ll pick up the cheque from reception – If any of my trades go wrong I’ll disappear.
• Don’t tell anyone – Shout it from the rooftops.
• I do things the Warren Buffet way – I don’t know anything about the stock market.
• What’s hot? – I’m a two-bit punter wanting to do $100,000 day trades with only $2,000 in the bank.
• I’m an experienced trader – I’ve been trading online for six months now.
• What are your commission rates? – Avoid me at all costs.
• I’m a big trader – I’m trying to get a discounted brokerage rate.
• My dad’s very wealthy – I am a massive credit risk.
• I’m looking for a broker – I’m a serial settlement risk, just ask my last three brokers.
• My email address is xyz@hotmail.com – I like anonymity. Don’t let me deal without money in the bank.

Analysts

• Nevertheless, although, however, maybe, perhaps, on the other hand, for the most part, generally speaking, more often than not, unless of course – I’m an economist.
• Yes, I’d love to be in the Herald Sun stock picking competition – I’m about to be publicly humiliated by a monkey, a dartboard, an astrologer, and a member of the Oarsome Foursome.

More about the author – Marcus Padley

Marcus Padley is a highly-recognised stockbroker and business media personality. He founded the Marcus Today Stock Market Newsletter in 1998. Over the years, the business has built a community of like-minded investors who want to survive and thrive in the stock market. This is achieved through a combination of daily stock market education, ideas and activities.

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