Blog Posts

A GmbH stands for “Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung”, which means “company with limited liability”. An LLC, on the other hand, is a Limited Liability Company located in the United States, and is the equivalent of Ltd. (limited) as used in the UK. Understanding GmbH Under a GmbH, an investor cannot lose more than the amount […]

What Is Payment-in-Kind (PIK)? Payment-in-kind (PIK) is a type of financing in which a borrower pays interest with additional debt rather than cash. It can also refer to the payment of dividends with stock rather than cash. PIK loans are often used by companies that are struggling to generate enough cash flow to meet their […]

What Is a Bearer Bond? A bearer bond is a debt security issued by a government or corporation. The bond is issued with no named owner, and whoever holds the bond can claim the interest payments and principal. Bearer bonds are also known as “bearer securities” or “unregistered securities”. Bearer bonds were at one point […]

Odd Lot An odd lot is an order for a security that is less than the standard unit of trading for that particular security. An odd lot trade may be more expensive than a trade involving a standard lot, due to the higher transaction costs associated with odd lot trades. An odd lot order may […]

Paradigm shifts occur when markets over-extrapolate one set of conditions into the future despite those conditions being unsustainable. The last decade and even the last 40 years are what traders and other market participants think will probably hold. However, that could easily be wrong because we’re now in a totally different world. If you take […]

Selling volatility is among the highest-risk trading strategies. Also known as being “short gamma”, selling volatility typically means selling options naked or on an uncovered basis. When you sell an option you have a fixed amount of upside – i.e., the premium of the option – and potentially unlimited downside. If you are short a […]

The 60/40 portfolio pertains to an asset allocation that is 60 percent stocks and 40 percent bonds. The general thinking is that the 60 percent in stocks gives the portfolio a high enough risk asset allocation such that it can generate quality returns while the 40 percent in bonds gives diversification and a capital preservation […]

In this article, we cover trading and investing in the metaverse. But first, what is the metaverse? The metaverse is a space where users of a certain platform can interact in a computer-generated virtual-reality environment with other users. The metaverse is making a big push as the next big tech trend. Facebook even went so […]

Currencies rise and fall for various reasons, but FX is a fundamentally macro asset class. While equities may move a lot based on idiosyncratic factors happening at the company or the individual trading patterns of a singular entity, currencies are much more heavily influenced by country- or jurisdiction-level factors. Factors that influence the fall in […]

A country’s net international investment position (NIIP) is the value of all its foreign financial assets minus all its foreign financial liabilities. A country’s NIIP can be either positive or negative. A positive NIIP indicates that a country is a creditor to the rest of the world and a negative NIIP indicates that it is […]