Glossary Of Trading

Wall Street

A street in Lower Manhattan that runs along the original route of the wall surrounding historical New Amsterdam, and around which traditionally the city's financial district stood. Today, a generic term for the financial (primarily securities) industry.

Weighted Average

An average achieved through adding relative values of components rather than their objective value, as in a regular average. The weighting of each component's contribution to the pre-divided total can be subject to different systems. Usually, the closer to the endpoint of the computation (the last value being computed), the higher its relative value. Thus, in a series: 4, 6, 3, 8, 4, instead of adding the numbers and then dividing by the number of components (5), we provide with each successive number a multiplier that increases the closer we are to the end of the series (1x4)+(2x6)+(3x3)+(4x8)+(5x4) and then divide by the total of multipliers (1+2+3+4+5=15).

White Knight

A potentially friendly buyer of a company, enlisted by the company in face of a potentially UNfriendly acquisition aimed at dismantling the company.