Every technical term a Statim Research report uses, defined in plain English. Definitions
describe how the term is used in these reports; they are simplified, not exhaustive. The same
term is explained the same way in every report, so a definition you read once holds for the
next one.
The average closing price over the last N trading days (SMA20 = 20 days, SMA50 = 50, SMA200 = 200). It smooths the day-to-day noise into a trend line; price above a rising average is generally read as strength, below a falling one as weakness.
Net debt
Total borrowings minus cash and short-term investments — what a company would still owe if it used every liquid dollar it has to pay debt down today. A better gauge of balance-sheet strain than gross debt on its own.
Non-cash charge
An expense that reduces reported profit without any money leaving the company — for example, re-valuing an obligation whose worth has changed. It affects reported earnings, not the bank balance, so cash flow and reported profit can diverge sharply.
Golden Cross
When the 50-day moving average crosses above the 200-day moving average. It is a widely-watched sign that the medium-term trend has turned higher than the long-term trend. Like its opposite (Death Cross), it is a lagging label — the rally that produced it is usually already several weeks or months old by the time the cross prints, so it confirms the regime rather than predicting it.
Death Cross
When the 50-day moving average crosses below the 200-day moving average. It is a widely-watched sign that the medium-term trend has turned lower than the long-term trend. It is a lagging label: by the time it prints, the decline is usually already underway, so it describes the regime rather than signaling it.
RSI (Relative Strength Index)
A 0–100 gauge of how fast and how far price has recently moved. Readings near the top of the range are conventionally called "overbought" (the move may be stretched); readings near the bottom are called "oversold"; readings around the middle are neutral. It describes the pace of the move that has already happened, not where price goes next.
ATR (Average True Range)
The average size of a day's price swing over the last 14 days, in dollars. A rough measure of how much the stock typically moves in a day.
Anchored VWAP
The average price actually paid per share, weighted by trading volume, measured from a chosen starting date (the "anchor" — usually a major low, high, or news event). It shows where the average buyer since that date stands: above it, that crowd is profitable; below it, they are underwater.
Support
A price area where falling prices have previously attracted enough buying to stop the decline. Expected to slow or pause a fall — not guaranteed to hold.
Resistance
The mirror of support: a price area where rising prices have previously run into enough selling to stall. Expected to slow or pause an advance.
Pivot points (floor-trader pivots)
Reference levels computed from the prior week's or month's high, low, and close using a standard formula traders have used for decades. They give a shared map of levels (P = the central pivot, R1/R2 = resistance levels above, S1/S2 = support levels below) that many market participants watch.
Breakout / breakdown
A move through a resistance level (breakout) or a support level (breakdown) that had held before, often signaling the start of a further move in the same direction — if it holds.
Retest
After a breakout, price often returns to the level it broke to "test" it from the other side. A successful retest (the level holds) strengthens the breakout; a failed one cancels it.
Neckline
The level connecting the highs (or lows) between the troughs/peaks of a reversal pattern such as a double bottom. Breaking the neckline is what completes the pattern.
Double bottom / double top
A reversal pattern: price makes two lows (or highs) at roughly the same area with a bounce in between, forming a "W" (or "M") shape. It suggests the prior trend is losing force.
Measured move (measure rule)
A convention for projecting a pattern's implied move: take the height of the pattern and project it from the breakout point. It is a guideline, not a promise.
Hammer
A single-day candlestick with a long lower shadow and a small body near the top: price fell hard during the day but buyers pushed it back up by the close. At a support level after a decline, it hints the selling is being rejected. Needs the next day's action to confirm.
Inverted hammer
A long upper shadow with a small body near the low, printed at support after a decline — a tentative sign that buyers are probing. Weaker than a hammer, and it needs the next day's action to confirm.
Shooting star
The hammer's mirror image: a long upper shadow with a small body near the low, printed at resistance after an advance — buyers pushed price up during the day but it was sold back down by the close. A possible top signal, also needing confirmation.
Engulfing candle (bullish/bearish)
A day whose price bar completely covers ("engulfs") the prior day's bar in the opposite direction. At a key level it signals a sharp shift in control between buyers and sellers.
Doji
A day where price closed almost exactly where it opened, leaving a very small body — a standoff between buyers and sellers. Meaningful at an extreme or key level; ordinary noise mid-range.
Morning star / evening star
A three-day reversal sequence: a strong day in the trend's direction, then a small hesitation day, then a strong day the other way that recovers well into the first day's range. A morning star (at a low) hints the decline is reversing; an evening star (at a high) is its bearish mirror. Both need follow-through to confirm.
Candlestick
A way of drawing one day's trading as a bar showing the open, close, high and low. The "body" spans open-to-close; the thin "wicks" (shadows) mark the day's extremes.
Rectangle / trading range
A sideways pattern where price bounces between roughly the same support floor and resistance ceiling for an extended period, until something resolves it.
Volume
The number of shares traded. Rising volume on a move suggests conviction behind it; a move on shrinking volume is less trustworthy.
Gap
When a stock opens sharply above or below the prior day's range, leaving a "gap" on the chart, usually on news. Gap edges often act as later support/resistance.
Swing high / swing low
A local peak or trough on the chart — a point where price reversed. Prior swings are the most common basis for support and resistance levels.
Market capitalization (market cap)
The stock market's total price tag for the company: share price × number of shares outstanding.
Shares outstanding
The total number of shares that exist for the company.
Dilution
An increase in the number of shares outstanding (from stock sales, employee stock compensation, warrant or convertible exercises). Each existing share then represents a smaller slice of the company.
ATM ("at-the-market" program)
A standing arrangement letting a company quietly sell new shares directly into the market over time, at market prices, whenever it chooses. Capacity to dilute — used or not.
Shelf registration
A pre-filed SEC registration that lets a company sell new securities quickly later, "off the shelf," without further paperwork delay.
SEPA / equity purchase facility
An agreement giving a company the option to sell new shares to a specific investor over time, up to a stated dollar amount. Similar in effect to an ATM: standing potential dilution.
Warrant
A security giving its holder the right to buy a share at a fixed price (the "strike") until an expiration date. "Out of the money" means the stock trades below the strike, so exercising would make no sense today.
Convertible (note/bond)
Debt that can be exchanged for shares under set terms — potential future dilution sitting inside the balance sheet.
Sell-side analyst
A research analyst at a brokerage or investment bank who publishes ratings, price targets, and earnings estimates on a company for the firm's clients. Their ratings drive institutional attention and are watched as sentiment signals even when their targets prove wrong.
Rating (Buy / Hold / Sell)
An analyst's summary opinion on the stock. Most firms use a five-tier scale (Strong Buy / Buy / Hold / Sell / Strong Sell) or three-tier (Buy / Hold / Sell); some use their own vocabulary (Outperform / Market Perform / Underperform). Different firms are not directly comparable, but a firm's own rating history on a name is.
Price target (PT)
An analyst's forecast of the stock's price roughly twelve months forward. It is a forecast, not a trigger or a stop, and analysts routinely revise it after earnings prints and material news.
Consensus rating / consensus price target
The average across all covering analysts, weighted or not depending on the aggregator. The consensus is a snapshot of the sell-side crowd, useful for gauging expectations — high consensus PT well above current price often means the sell-side is late to bad news; consensus PT below current price often means the reverse.
Coverage
The set of sell-side analysts who publish research on a company. A stock can have twenty covering analysts (mega-cap) or zero (many small caps). Absence of coverage is itself information — no institutional consensus PT, no earnings estimate history, no upgrade/downgrade catalyst risk.
Stale analyst rating
A rating that has not been updated after material company events that would normally trigger a revision — a missed earnings print, a guidance cut, a major 8-K. Stale ratings still appear in consensus figures and can drag the visible consensus away from where post-event reality actually is. The report reads each covering firm — never an individual analyst — as Fresh, Aging, Stale or Withdrawn, and names the specific unaddressed events behind the reading.
Form 4
The SEC filing an officer, director, or large insider must submit within two business days of buying or selling their company's stock. The primary record of insider activity.
Form 144
A notice an insider files of an intent to sell restricted stock. It signals a planned sale; it is not the sale itself.
10b5-1 plan
A pre-scheduled, automatic trading plan insiders can set up in advance so their sales happen on a fixed schedule rather than by choice in the moment. Sales under a plan carry less information than discretionary sales.
8-K / 6-K
"Current report" filings companies use to disclose material news to the SEC (8-K for U.S. companies, 6-K for foreign-based issuers).
10-Q / 10-K / 20-F
The standard SEC financial reports: 10-Q quarterly (unaudited), 10-K annual (audited), 20-F the annual report for foreign-based issuers.
Going concern
Auditor language flagging substantial doubt that a company can fund itself for the next year. Its absence is meaningful too.
Buyback (share repurchase)
The company using its own cash to buy back its shares, reducing the share count — the opposite of dilution.
Short interest / borrow
Shares sold short (borrowed and sold, betting on a decline). High short interest can fuel sharp rallies when shorts buy back ("short squeeze").
Stock-based compensation
The cost of paying employees in shares rather than cash. It does not consume cash, but it creates new shares, so it shows up as dilution rather than as a cash expense.
Implied volatility (IV)
The options market's forecast of how much the stock will move, embedded in option prices. IV typically rises into a known event (an "event premium") and drops after.
Open interest
The number of option contracts currently outstanding at a strike — a gauge of where options activity is concentrated.
Strike price
The fixed price at which an option allows buying (call) or selling (put) the stock.
Expiration (expiry)
The date an option contract ceases to exist. An expiry "brackets" an event if the event happens before the option expires.
Call / put
A call option is the right to buy the stock at the strike price; a put is the right to sell. Buying calls expresses an upside view; buying puts, a downside view.
Debit spread
Buying one option and selling another against it to lower cost and cap both the maximum loss and the maximum gain — a defined-risk way to express a view.
DARTs
"Daily average revenue trades" — brokerage-industry jargon for how many billable customer trades happen per day.
PDUFA date
The FDA's deadline for deciding on a drug application — a scheduled binary event for drug companies.
Interim analysis
A scheduled early look at an ongoing clinical trial's data, taken before the trial finishes. Its timing often depends on how fast events accumulate, so the date is usually approximate.
Listing minimum ($1.00 rule)
Nasdaq/NYSE require a stock to stay above $1.00 (with grace procedures) to remain listed. Sustained trading below it starts a compliance clock.
Distribution / accumulation
Sustained selling by large holders into strength (distribution) versus sustained buying into weakness (accumulation) — inferred from price and volume behavior, never directly observable.
Invalidation
The specific price level or event that would prove this report's read wrong. Every technical read in these reports comes with one.
Quality of earnings and cash
Accruals ratio
Reported profit minus the cash the business actually generated, measured against the size of the business. A negative number means cash is arriving faster than profit is being booked, which is usually the healthier direction. A positive and rising number is the classic signal that reported earnings are running ahead of the cash behind them.
Cash conversion
Cash generated by operations divided by reported net income. It asks how much of the reported profit showed up as cash. The ratio is meaningless when net income is negative or very small, because a negative or tiny denominator produces a number that reads as favourable and is not; where that happens the report says "not meaningful" and measures cash against revenue instead.
Deferred revenue
Money customers have already paid for goods or services not yet delivered. It sits on the balance sheet as a liability until the work is done. Deferred revenue growing faster than revenue means cash is coming in ahead of the sale being recorded, which for a subscription business is the single strongest quality marker available.
Days sales outstanding
How long, on average, customers take to pay after being invoiced. Falling is better. Rising on a like-for-like quarter can mean sales are being booked faster than they are being collected.
Free cash flow
Cash generated by operations after the spending needed to maintain and grow the asset base. It does not subtract the cost of shares issued to employees, which is why a report that cares about the difference shows the figure both ways.
Share-count creep
The steady growth in the number of shares outstanding from routine equity compensation, as distinct from a one-off raise. Small each quarter, material over years, and easy to miss because no single filing announces it.
Filing hygiene
Whether a company's filing record is clean: no restatements of previously reported figures, no change of auditor, no late filings. It is a binary check rather than a trend, and one failure carries more weight than a run of clean quarters.
Restatement
A company correcting financial statements it has already filed, because the original figures were wrong. It is the strongest single signal that reported numbers could not be relied on.
Like-for-like quarter
Comparing a quarter against the same quarter a year earlier rather than against the one immediately before it, so that seasonal patterns do not read as trends.
Report vocabulary
Verification Score
The share of a report's data points that were confirmed against a primary source, as opposed to derived or taken from secondary reporting. It measures how much of the report rests on original documents. It is a completeness measure and says nothing about the company.
Conviction
How strongly a stated view or grade is held, reported as High, Moderate or Low. It describes the quality and agreement of the evidence behind the view, not how large the expected move is.
Weight (of a piece of evidence)
How much a single point counts toward the conclusion, reported as Heaviest, Heavy, Moderate or Counterweight. A Counterweight is evidence that cuts against the conclusion and is shown anyway.
Counter-case
The strongest argument against the report's own conclusion, written by the same people who reached it. It appears whether or not the conclusion is held confidently.