In April I checked the analysts’ recommendations as tabulated online. In the real world, if you see something, or someone, ‘attractive,’ you want to ‘hold’ it (or her or him), but not in the arcane world of financial analysis which has more to do with alchemy than chemistry.
Imagine if you went to an analytical laboratory and each chemist decided to use his or her own unique and euphemistic terms to describe the results. For strychnine one lab report would say ‘drinkable’; another would say ‘Prussic Acid’; a third would say ‘strong stuff’; a fourth, ‘kills all known germs’; and so on.
If you did drink it, doubtless your heirs and successors would be told, ‘Yes, of course it’s drinkable – but we didn’t say you wouldn’t push up the daisies afterwards.’ Or, ‘Yes it kills all known germs – and humans too. But you never asked!’
One thing you can be certain about is that, if chemists followed the euphemistic practices of sell-aside analysis, the word ‘poison’ would never hit a lab report.
So we thought it might be useful to run a small dictionary of brokers’ recommendations for the use of novice IROs or bearish investors who think that Daddy Bear really let Goldilocks get away with siphoning off all the porridge.
Accumulate – Verb, derived from Latin cumulus – cloud.
Def. My crystal ball is very cloudy, let’s do nothing precipitate, heh?
Subtext: If you check the small print you’ll see we did their IPO.
Hold – Verb, derived from the Germanic root ‘halt’ as in the phrase’the halt and the lame.’
Def. Of course these are paraplegic stocks – but it would be really rude to say so wouldn’t it?
Subtext: If you read the WSJ you’ll soon see we’re hoping to do their next public offering.
Buy – Verb, derived from Middle English bugge – without an ‘r’ at the end, but you can add it if you follow the advice.
Def. This is an example of ‘antiphrasis’, which is the use of a word to mean its opposite. When someone says ‘buy’ they really mean ‘sell.’
Subtext: Look on my tombstones you unwary and despair. We are doing the IPO.
Strong Buy – As above.
Subtext: But this time, we’re not kidding.
Neutral – Adjective, from the Latin word neuter – usually meaning of neither gender.
Def. Not since Icarus has anything fallen so fast. It’s too late to see the writing on the wall – look at the splatter on the sidewalk instead.
Subtext: Hey a broker’s gotta make a buck somehow, don’t he?
Attractive – Adjective, from the Latin attrahere, to pull towards – or to suck in.
Def. This stock is waiting for the sucker who is born every minute.
Subtext: Never mind the quality, just look at those curves!
LT attractive – As above but over an even longer time period.
Subtext: By the time you’ve lost your shirt on this one, I’ll be a partner somewhere else.
Repulsive – Adjective,from the Latin repulsare, to push away.
Def. Opposite of attractive. A nonce word, coined specially for this publication to illustrate how rare it is to get a downer.
Subtext: Speculator is too cynical for words – at least for the way words are typically used in analysts’ reports.
Underperform – a verb masquerading as an important adjective.
Def. Sell.
Subtext: Oh, didn’t I tell you to drop that one?
Outperform – See ‘underperform’ above.
Perform in line – See above.
Subtext: These are not cheerleaders – these are escaped gargoyles doing the Macarena.
Maintain – Verb from the Latin manu tenere, to hold in the hand.
Def. To keep steady or, Don’t panic! This is actually supposed to be an upgrade from accumulate, but why you would want to merely hold something that is better than a stock you’d want to accumulate, I don’t know.
Subtext: Scrape this off your hand into the bush.
Trading buy – Noun, derivation obscure.
Def. Even more obscure.
Subtext: I wonder if they’d take my old baseball cards for this stock?
Top pick – Adjective, derivation obscure, but could be reference to the habit of putting the good stuff on the top of produce displays.
Def. See strong buy.
Subtext: Guess who’s underwriting this issue!
Sell – Verb, obsolete.
Def. To get rid of something in flat panic before it is rendered totally valueless.
Subtext: That’ll teach the IRO to answer my phone calls.
The Speculator
