Trading and market glossary
Plain-English definitions of Fed net liquidity, TGA, RRP, RRG, implied volatility, dealer gamma, GEX, SEC filings, PDUFA dates and other market terms.
Fed net liquidity
A market-monitoring proxy commonly calculated as Federal Reserve assets minus the Treasury General Account and overnight reverse-repo balances.
It summarizes three large balance-sheet flows that can add or remove dollar liquidity. It is a context indicator, not a guaranteed equity-market signal.
Treasury General Account (TGA)
The U.S. Treasury’s operating cash account at the Federal Reserve.
When the Treasury rebuilds or spends down this balance, bank-reserve and money-market liquidity can change, all else equal.
Overnight reverse repo (ON RRP)
A Federal Reserve facility through which eligible counterparties place cash overnight against Treasury collateral.
Changes in facility usage help explain where short-term cash is being parked and are one component of common net-liquidity proxies.
Real yield
A yield adjusted for expected inflation. Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities provide a market-based real-yield reference.
Real yields affect discount rates and the relative appeal of long-duration assets, gold and cash-flow streams far in the future.
Yield curve
The set of interest rates available on otherwise comparable debt across different maturities.
The level and slope help traders frame policy expectations, growth risk, inflation risk and financing conditions.
Financial conditions
A combined view of how rates, credit spreads, equity prices, volatility and currencies affect the ease of obtaining finance.
Conditions can tighten or loosen before a policy rate changes, altering the backdrop for risk assets and the real economy.
Relative Rotation Graph (RRG)
A two-axis visualization of relative strength and relative momentum versus a benchmark.
It helps compare several sectors at once and distinguish leadership, weakening, lagging and improving behavior.
Implied volatility (IV)
The volatility level embedded in an option price under an option-pricing model.
IV is the market price of uncertainty. Comparing it across strikes, expiries and its own history helps assess whether optionality is relatively rich or cheap.
Realized volatility
A backward-looking measure of how much an underlying asset actually moved over a chosen observation window.
Comparing realized volatility with implied volatility helps frame whether option premium has historically over- or underpriced subsequent movement.
IV rank
The position of current implied volatility between its high and low over a selected historical window, often one year.
It gives context to the current volatility level, but it should not be used alone because one extreme observation can distort the range.
Volatility skew
The difference in implied volatility across option strikes for the same expiry.
Skew shows where protection or upside exposure is most expensive and how the market prices asymmetric tail risk.
Volatility term structure
The pattern of implied volatility across option expiration dates.
A kink or inversion can identify event risk and distinguish short-term stress from longer-horizon uncertainty.
Dealer gamma exposure (GEX)
An estimate of aggregate option gamma associated with dealer positioning, inferred from public option data and model assumptions.
The sign and concentration of estimated gamma can help frame whether hedging flows may dampen or amplify price changes. Dealer inventory is not publicly observed, so GEX remains an estimate.
Gamma flip
The underlying price at which a dealer-gamma estimate changes sign.
Traders use it as a regime reference for possible hedging-flow behavior, not as a guaranteed support or resistance level.
Expected move
An option-implied estimate of the magnitude, not direction, of a possible move over a stated horizon.
It provides a common scale for comparing the market’s priced range with a trader’s own scenario and with prior realized moves.
0DTE options
Options that expire at the end of the current trading day.
Their very short remaining life makes gamma, time decay and intraday liquidity especially important.
10-K and 10-Q filings
SEC filings containing annual and quarterly company disclosures, including financial statements, risk factors and management discussion.
Comparing language and disclosures across periods can reveal changes in risk, outlook and management emphasis that headline numbers miss.
SEC Form 4
A filing used to report many changes in beneficial ownership by company insiders.
It provides primary-source context for insider purchases, sales and other ownership changes, though transaction motives are not always observable.
Post-earnings announcement drift (PEAD)
The documented tendency for prices, on average, to continue moving in the direction of an earnings surprise after the announcement.
It is a research effect, not a certainty for an individual company; liquidity, valuation and later news can overwhelm it.
PDUFA date
A target date associated with the FDA review timeline for a drug application under the Prescription Drug User Fee Act framework.
It can be a major biotech catalyst, but dates may change and an expected decision can still produce multiple outcomes.
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