Investments

Front 1

Guaranteed insurance contract (GIC)

Back 1

Large denomination debt instruments offered by insurance companies.
-guarantees a specified rate of return for the life of the contract
-considered highly conservative and relatively risk free
-many 401k plans offer a GIC fund

Front 2

Private placements

Back 2

Securities sold to a small number of investors
-typically sold to institutional investors, such as banks or corporations
-the securities do not need to be registered

Front 3

Positively skewed distribution

Back 3

Long tail to the right (outliers to the right)
-stock market returns are positively skewed

Front 4

Negatively skewed distribution

Back 4

Long tail to the left (outliers to the left)

Front 5

Log normal distribution

Back 5

A distribution of a normal distribution's mean and variance
-tracks the mean and variance of a data set's distribution
-accuracy in price prediction serves as the basis of Black-Scholes-Merton options pricing model

Front 6

Kurtosis

Back 6

A statistical measure that tells us if a distribution is more or less peaked than a normal distribution
-by definition, normal distributions have kurtosis = 3
-most statistical reports report on excess kurtosis (kurtosis - 3)

Front 7

Leptokurtic distribution

Back 7

A distribution that is more peaked than normal

Front 8

Platykurtic distribution

Back 8

A distribution that is less peaked than normal

Front 9

Mesokurtic distribution

Back 9

A normal distribution

Front 10

Variance (VAR(r))

Back 10

square of the standard deviation