An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investment banks, who also arrange for the shares to be listed on one or more stock exchanges. Through this process, colloquially known as floating, or going public, a privately held company is transformed into a public company. Initial public offerings can be used to raise new equity capital for companies, to monetize the investments of private shareholders such as company founders or private equity investors, and to enable easy trading of existing holdings or future capital raising by becoming publicly traded.
In finance, being short in an asset means investing in such a way that the investor will profit if the market value of the asset falls. This is the opposite of the more common long position, where the investor will profit if the market value of the asset rises. An investor that sells an asset short is, as to that asset, a short seller.
A shareholder of corporate stock refers to an individual or legal entity that is registered by the corporation as the legal owner of shares of the share capital of a public or private corporation. Shareholders may be referred to as members of a corporation. A person or legal entity becomes a shareholder in a corporation when their name and other details are entered in the corporation's register of shareholders or members, and unless required by law the corporation is not required or permitted to enquire as to the beneficial ownership of the shares. A corporation generally cannot own shares of itself.
Carl Celian Icahn is an American businessman, investor, and philanthropist. He is the founder and controlling shareholder of Icahn Enterprises, a public company and diversified conglomerate holding company based in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida. Icahn's business model is to take large stakes in companies that he believes will appreciate from changes to corporate policy. Subsequently, Icahn then pressures management to make the changes that he believes will benefit shareholders, and him. Widely regarded as one of the most successful hedge fund managers of all time and one of the greatest investors on Wall Street, he was one of the first activist shareholders and is credited with making that investment strategy mainstream for hedge funds.
An investor is a person who allocates financial capital with the expectation of a future return (profit) or to gain an advantage (interest). Through this allocated capital the investor usually purchases some species of property. Types of investments include equity, debt, securities, real estate, infrastructure, currency, commodity, token, derivatives such as put and call options, futures, forwards, etc. This definition makes no distinction between the investors in the primary and secondary markets. That is, someone who provides a business with capital and someone who buys a stock are both investors. An investor who owns stock is a shareholder.
In finance and accounting, par value means stated value or face value of a financial instrument. Expressions derived from this term include at par, over par and under par.
The Bucharest Stock Exchange is the stock exchange of Romania located in Bucharest. In 2023, the BVB's market capitalization increased by 52.7% to $64.9 billion. As of 2023, there were 85 companies listed on the BVB.
The Jamaica Stock Exchange is the principal stock exchange of Jamaica, also known as JSE. Incorporated in 1968, JSE opened in 1969 in Kingston, Jamaica. Today, the JSE is one of the largest stock exchanges in the Caribbean by size and market capitalization. As of 30 September 2019, there is a total number of 85 companies and 120 securities listed to the JSE, and a market capitalization of just over JM$2 trillion. The Jamaica Stock Exchange is composed of multiple markets: Main Market, Junior Market, USD Market, and Bond Market. The JSE is also recognized as one of the most sector-diverse exchanges in the Caribbean. The key sectors include banking and finance, retail, manufacturing, insurance, leisure, communications, conglomerate, and services and real estate. The current chairman is Ian McNaughton and the deputy chairman is Gary Peart. The managing director is Marlene Street Forrest.
Farkhad Teimurovich Akhmedov is an Azerbaijani-Russian businessman and a former politician in Russia, departing his role in 2009. He is a former representative in the Federation Council of the Russian Federation.
William Albert Ackman is an American billionaire hedge fund manager who is the founder and chief executive officer of Pershing Square Capital Management, a hedge fund management company. His investment approach has made him an activist investor. As of June 2024, Ackman's net worth was estimated at $9.3 billion by Forbes.
A venture round is a type of funding round used for venture capital financing, by which startup companies obtain investment, generally from venture capitalists and other institutional investors. The availability of venture funding is among the primary stimuli for the development of new companies and technologies.
Stocks consist of all the shares by which ownership of a corporation or company is divided. A single share of the stock means fractional ownership of the corporation in proportion to the total number of shares. This typically entitles the shareholder (stockholder) to that fraction of the company's earnings, proceeds from liquidation of assets, or voting power, often dividing these up in proportion to the number of like shares each stockholder owns. Not all stock is necessarily equal, as certain classes of stock may be issued, for example, without voting rights, with enhanced voting rights, or with a certain priority to receive profits or liquidation proceeds before or after other classes of shareholders.
Block, Inc. is a U.S. listed company founded by Jack Dorsey and Jim McKelvey in 2009. It is a financial technology conglomerate. The company reportedly serves 56 million users and 4 million businesses, and processes payments worth US$228 billion annually as of 2023.
Funding Circle is a commercial lender. Originally it was a peer-to-peer lending marketplace that allowed the public to lend money directly to small and medium-sized businesses. Through this exchange businesses access lower costs of financing than they would get at a bank and the public are able to become lenders and in doing so make a return on their capital. It closed its lending option to "retail investors" between 2020 and 2022, and then announced, in March 2022, that it had made the closure permanent.
Muddy Waters Research LLC is an American privately held due diligence based investment firm that conducts investigative research on public companies while also taking investment positions that reflect their research. It has exposed accounting problems and fraud at several companies, primarily in China but also in other countries in Asia, Europe and North America.
SAC Capital Advisors was a group of hedge funds founded by Steven A. Cohen in 1992. The firm employed approximately 800 people in 2010 across its offices located in Stamford, Connecticut and New York City, and various offices. It reportedly lost many of its traders in the wake of various investigations by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). In 2010, the SEC opened an insider trading investigation of SAC and in 2013 several former employees were indicted by the U.S. Department of Justice. In November 2013, the firm itself pleaded guilty to insider trading charges and paid $1.2 billion in penalties. The firm shrank after returning the vast majority of its outside investor capital. Point72 Asset Management was established as a separate family office in 2014. SAC ceased to exist as a separate entity in 2016. Point 72, essentially the continuation of SAC, manages 30 Billion as of 2023.
Louis Tung Jung Hsieh is a Chinese businessman and lawyer and the global chief financial officer (CFO) and director of Hesai Group, a company supplying three-dimensional light detection and ranging (LiDAR) solutions. Hsieh joined Hesai as CFO in April 2021 and became a director in June 2021. He helped take the company public on Nasdaq in February 2023, with an initial public offering (IPO) that was oversubscribed by approximately 20 times.
Hindenburg Research LLC is a U.S. investment research firm with a focus on activist short-selling founded by Nathan Anderson in 2017. Named after the 1937 Hindenburg disaster, which they characterize as a human-made avoidable disaster, the firm generates public reports via its website that allege corporate fraud and malfeasance. Companies that have been the subjects of their reports include Adani Group, Nikola, Clover Health, Block, Inc., Kandi, and Lordstown Motors. These reports also feature defenses of the practice of short-selling and explanations of how short-sells can "play a critical role in exposing fraud and protecting investors."
Aavas Financiers, also known as Aavas, is a Jaipur based housing finance company known for providing home loans in the rural and semi-urban locations of India. Aavas is registered with National Housing Bank as a Housing Finance Company and was granted the license in August 2011.
Clover Health Investments, Corp. is an American health care company founded in 2014. The company provides Medicare Advantage (MA) insurance plans and operates as a direct contracting entity with the U.S. government. The company manages care for Medicare beneficiaries in 11 states and started trading publicly on January 8, 2021.
