Technical analysis

Similar financial terms

Technical insolvency
Default on a legal obligation of the firm. For example, technical insolvency occurs when a firm doesn't pay a bill.

Technical descriptors
Variables that are used to describe the market on a technical basis.

Technical condition of a market
Demand and supply factors affecting price, in particular the net position, either long or short, of the dealer community.

Technical analysts
Also called chartists or technicians, analysts who use mechanical rules to detect changes in the supply of and demand for a stock and capitalize on the expected change.

SWOT analysis
A SWOT analysis assesses the strenghts, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of a certain entity. Thus far, it is a common approach to formulating firm strategy via assessments of firm capabilities in relation to the market

Fundamental analysis
A method of research that studies basic financial information to forecast profits, supply and demand, industry strength, management ability, and other intrinsic matters affecting a stock's market value and growth potential.

Vertical analysis
The process of dividing each expense item in the income statement of a given year by net sales to identify expense items that rise faster or slower than a change in sales.

Sensitivity analysis
Analysis of the effect on a project's profitability due to changes in sales, cost, and so on.

Scenario analysis
The use of horizon analysis to project bond total returns under different reinvestment rates and future market yields.

Regression analysis
A statistical technique that can be used to estimate relationships between variables.

Pro forma capital structure analysis
A method of analyzing the impact of alternative capital structure choices on a firm's credit statistics and reported financial results, especially to determine whether the firm will be able to use projected tax shield benefits fully.

Performance attribution analysis
The decomposition of a money manager's performance results to explain the reasons why those results were achieved. This analysis seeks to answer the following questions: (a) What were the major sources of added value? (b) Was short-term factor timing statistically significant? (c) Was market timing statistically significant? And (d), Was security selection statistically significant?

Multiple-discriminant analysis (MDA)
Statistical technique for distinguishing between two groups on the basis of their observed characteristics.

Mean-variance analysis
Evaluation of risky prospects based on the expected value and variance of possible outcomes.

BARRA's performance analysis (PERFAN)
A method developed by BARRA, a consulting firm in Berkeley, California. It is commonly used by institutional investors applying performance attribution analysis to evaluate their money managers' performances.

Break-even analysis
An analysis of the level of sales at which a project would make zero profit.

Cluster analysis
A statistical technique that identifies clusters of stocks whose returns are highly correlated within each cluster and relatively uncorrelated between clusters. Cluster analysis has identified groupings such as growth, cyclical, stable and energy stocks.

Common-base-year analysis
The representing of accounting information over multiple years as percentages of amounts in an initial year.

Common-size analysis
The representing of balance sheet items as percentages of assets and of income statement items as percentages of sales.

Comparative credit analysis
A method of analysis in which a firm is compared to others that have a desired target debt rating in order to infer an appropriate financial ratio target.

Credit analysis
The process of analyzing information on companies and bond issues in order to estimate the ability of the issuer to live up to its future contractual obligations.

Design Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (DFMEA)
An analytical technique used by a design responsible engineer/team as a means to assure, to the extent possible, that potential failure modes and, their associated causes/mechanisms have been considered and addressed.