Thesis
Risk & psychologyThe specific, checkable claims that justify holding an investment.
In plain terms
If no observable outcome could prove it wrong, it is not a thesis — it is a hope.
1492 terms
Glossary
Every term is defined twice: once the way a filing would put it, and once the way somebody would explain it to you across a table. The second one is usually the one that sticks.
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Thesis break
Fundamental analysisThe specific event named in advance as disproof of an investment case, having actually occurred.
In plain terms
The cleanest reason to sell there is, and the whole reason for naming the disproof before buying.
Random walk
Technical analysisAlso called: Random walk hypothesis
A price series generated purely by chance, in which each step is independent of the ones before it.
In plain terms
Plot 250 coin flips and you get trends, levels, breakouts and a passable head and shoulders. Chart readers cannot reliably tell one from a real series — which is why "it looks like a clean setup" is not evidence.
Investment thesis
Fundamental analysisA written statement of why you are buying, what it is worth, and what would prove you wrong.
In plain terms
If nothing could prove it wrong, it is a belief rather than an analysis.
Conviction
Risk & psychologyConfidence in a thesis sufficient to hold a position through adverse price movement.
In plain terms
Indistinguishable from stubbornness unless you wrote down in advance what would change your mind.
Disconfirming evidence
Risk & psychologyInformation that contradicts an existing belief or thesis.
In plain terms
A falling price is not disconfirming evidence. Deteriorating fundamentals are.
Falsifiability
Risk & psychologyThe requirement that a written thesis name in advance the specific, observable events that would prove it wrong.
In plain terms
What separates analysis from hoping. A thesis that cannot be wrong cannot be right either, because every development will be reinterpreted as confirmation.
Opportunity cost
Risk & psychologyThe return given up by choosing one use of capital over the next best alternative.
In plain terms
Money stuck in a broken thesis is not merely flat — it is missing everything else it could have been doing.
Position sizing by conviction
Risk & psychologySetting the size of a holding from how well the business is understood and how strong the evidence is, rather than weighting every idea equally.
In plain terms
The honest version cuts both ways: a thesis you can barely defend gets a size that can go to zero without mattering.
Securities Lending and Borrowing
Trading & ordersAlso called: SLB
A screen-based, order-driven and anonymous market for borrowing shares against a fee, with the clearing corporation standing between lender and borrower.
In plain terms
The only route that carries a short past an expiry date without a paid roll, with tenures running to about a year. The catch is availability: in exactly the names a bearish thesis tends to be about, there may be no lender at any price, and the lender can recall early.
Spring
Technical analysisIn Wyckoff analysis, a brief dip below the support of a range that triggers the stops resting there and is reclaimed within a few sessions.
In plain terms
The one part of the framework that makes a falsifiable, time-bound prediction. If support is not reclaimed quickly, the thesis is dead and you exit without interpreting anything.
Tax-aware selling
Regulation & taxTiming an exit with the tax consequence in view — the holding period, the annual long-term exemption, and setting realised losses off against gains.
In plain terms
Worth a few weeks of patience when the thesis is intact and the twelve-month mark is close. Never the deciding factor: tax on a gain costs far less than a large fall suffered while waiting for a date.
Value trap
Fundamental analysisA stock that appears cheap on conventional metrics but whose business is permanently deteriorating.
In plain terms
It stays cheap and gets cheaper. Cheapness alone is never a thesis.