Glossary of quantum-model, market-conditions, and risk terms
Current Price: The current price is the most recent share price our market-data provider reported for the stock. Day changes and other percent figures are measured from it. It is the last reported price rather than a live tick, so a broker screen may show a slightly different number during market hours.
Moves vs the S&P 500 (Beta): Beta measures the sensitivity of a stock's returns to S&P 500 returns, estimated via OLS regression over a rolling 1-year window of daily returns. A beta above 1 amplifies both gains and losses relative to the index. Beta is a standard input to portfolio risk measures.
Typical daily swing: Daily volatility (σ) is the one-standard-deviation range of daily price changes in dollar terms, computed over a trailing 30-day window. It is the standard measure of how widely a stock's daily price changes spread. A higher σ means a more volatile stock.
Google Interest: Google Interest scores the relative search volume for "<TICKER> stock" via Google Trends over the trailing month, normalised to 0–100 where 100 is peak interest in the period. Spikes in retail search interest often precede elevated volume and price volatility, making this a useful leading indicator of crowd attention.
Interest change 7d: Interest change 7d measures the momentum of retail attention: the percent change in Google search interest over the most recent 7-day window vs the prior 7-day window. A sharp positive reading often coincides with news catalysts or social-media amplification; a declining reading may signal fading interest after an initial spike.
Social Hype Score: Social Hype Score is a composite indicator combining Google Trends momentum and (when enabled) Twitter/X sentiment into a single 0–100 normalised score. 50 represents neutral; readings above 70 indicate elevated crowd attention that can amplify price moves in either direction. It is an input feature to the ML classifier.
StockTwits Sentiment: StockTwits sentiment is the fraction of messages tagged as "positive" on the StockTwits platform over the trailing 24-hour window. It reflects the real-time mood of retail traders who self-classify their sentiment. Extreme readings (>80% or <20%) can indicate crowded positioning and potential mean-reversion.
Analyst Rating: Analyst rating is the mean Wall Street consensus score, where 1 = Strong Buy and 5 = Strong Sell. Consensus ratings are a lagging indicator — they reflect institutional opinion but are slow to update. The platform uses them as one input among many rather than a primary signal.
Analyst Target Upside: Analyst target upside is the percentage difference between the consensus 12-month price target and the current market price. A positive value indicates the street collectively expects appreciation. This metric can differ widely between stocks and is a lagging measure that analysts revise after the price has moved.
Upgrades (30d): Upgrades (30d) counts the number of analyst rating improvements (e.g. Hold → Buy, Sell → Hold) published for this ticker in the trailing 30-day window. Multiple upgrades in a short period can signal a turning point in institutional sentiment and often precede increased fund inflows.
Analysts Covering: Analyst coverage is the count of sell-side analysts who have an active rating on this ticker, aggregated from FMP's consensus feed. It is a neutral metric — it does not itself indicate positive or negative sentiment, only how much Street attention the name gets.
Avg Price Target: The average (consensus) 12-month price target published by covering analysts. Shown alongside the current price so the reader can see how far apart the two are.
Buy Ratings: Count of analysts with an active Buy or Strong Buy rating on this ticker. A high buy count relative to hold/sell counts indicates a positive sell-side consensus — a lagging, herd-following signal that is shown as a reference point, not as a recommendation.
Hold Ratings: Count of analysts with an active Hold rating. A large hold count relative to buy/sell suggests the Street sees limited near-term catalyst in either direction.
Sell Ratings: Count of analysts with an active Sell or Strong Sell rating. A high sell count relative to buy/hold counts indicates a negative sell-side consensus, shown as a reference point.
News Sentiment: News sentiment is the average tone score of recent news headlines for this ticker. Each headline is scored by a language model on a scale from −1 (strongly negative) through 0 (neutral) to +1 (strongly positive), and the scores are averaged over the trailing 7-day headline window. It is an input feature to the ML classifier. It is a level, not a change — see Sentiment Trend for whether the tone is improving or deteriorating.
Sentiment Trend: Sentiment Trend measures the direction of travel in news tone rather than its level. Headlines in the trailing 7-day window are split at a 3-day boundary and the trend is mean(recent scores) − mean(older scores). A stock can carry a negative sentiment level and a positive sentiment trend at the same time: the news is bad, and it is getting less bad. Small values are noise, which is why the ±0.10 dead band is left uncolored.
News Count (7d): News Count is the number of news headlines about this ticker, published in the trailing 7 days, that were found and successfully scored for tone. It measures how loudly the market is talking about a company and says nothing about whether the talk is good or bad — a scandal and a record quarter generate headlines alike. Because the count is capped at 20 and not deduplicated, a single heavily-syndicated event can push it to its ceiling. Read it alongside News Sentiment, which supplies the direction that this number deliberately does not.
Call/Put Ratio: The call/put ratio divides total call open interest by total put open interest across all strikes and expiries. A high ratio suggests traders are positioning for upside (or hedging short positions); a low ratio suggests hedging or negative positioning. Extreme readings can indicate crowded positioning that may reverse.
Smart Money Flow: Smart money flow is a directional indicator that attempts to isolate large-lot institutional order activity from retail noise. A positive reading suggests institutional buying pressure; negative suggests institutional selling. It is derived from intraday tape analysis and is inherently noisy on individual days.
Concentration (HHI): The Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI) sums the squares of your portfolio weights, producing a number between 0 and 1. A portfolio of 10 equally weighted names scores 0.10; putting everything in one stock scores 1.00. Its inverse (1 / HHI) is the "effective number of names" you actually hold — a useful reality check when a few positions dominate. High concentration is not automatically wrong (a strong view has to be expressed somehow), but it does mean a single company's bad news becomes your portfolio's bad news, so we flag it as a caution rather than an error.
Unusual Call Activity: Unusual call activity flags when call-option volume for this ticker significantly exceeds its rolling 20-day average. It is expressed as a multiple of the average (e.g. 3× = three times normal volume). Elevated readings can indicate informed positioning before earnings or catalysts, but may also reflect retail speculation.
Short % of Float: Short percentage of float measures the fraction of the available share float that is currently sold short. High short interest (>20%) reflects a significant negative view but also creates potential for a short squeeze if positive catalysts emerge. It is updated bi-monthly from FINRA data and is inherently lagged.
P/E Ratio: The price-to-earnings ratio divides the current share price by trailing 12-month earnings per share (TTM EPS). It is the most widely used valuation multiple. A very low P/E can indicate distress or deep value; a very high P/E implies the market is pricing in strong future growth. Comparison across sectors is misleading — use sector-relative percentiles.
Quality Score: Quality Score is a heuristic screen of how profitable a company is, blending return on equity (profit earned on shareholders' money) with profit margin (share of each sales dollar kept). Higher is better; it is a fundamental sanity check and not a probability, and it ignores leverage — a high score does not mean low debt.
Growth Score: Growth Score is a heuristic screen of how fast a company is growing, blending recent revenue and earnings growth. Higher is faster; it is backward-looking and can be lumpy year to year, and it is a fundamental sanity check, not a probability.
Value Score: Value Score is a heuristic screen of how cheap a stock looks on earnings, derived from the P/E ratio and flipped so a lower P/E produces a higher score. A high Value Score means the stock is cheap relative to earnings, but cheap is not automatically good — it can reflect a value trap where the market expects trouble. It is a fundamental sanity check, not a probability.
EPS Growth (YoY): EPS growth measures the year-over-year percentage change in earnings per share, comparing the most recently reported trailing-twelve-month EPS with the same figure one year prior. Sustained positive EPS growth is a key indicator of improving underlying business performance and is used as a feature in the ML classifier.
EPS Surprise: Earnings surprise compares the earnings per share a company actually reported for its most recent quarter with the consensus estimate analysts published beforehand, computed as (actual EPS − estimated EPS) ÷ |estimated EPS| × 100. A positive surprise means the company beat what the market was told to expect; a negative one means it missed. It is a different question from EPS growth, which compares earnings with the same period a year earlier — a company can beat a lowered estimate while earnings shrink, or miss a high one while earnings grow. Two failure modes. Expectations are the yardstick, and companies guide analysts before reporting, so a beat can be a beat of a bar that was quietly moved. And because the estimate sits in the denominator, the percentage is unreliable whenever that estimate is near zero: a one-cent beat against a two-cent estimate posts +50%. The share-price reaction depends on guidance and what investors had already priced in, not on the headline number alone.
Revenue Growth (YoY): Revenue growth is the year-over-year percentage change in total revenue (top-line), reflecting the company's ability to expand its business. It is distinct from EPS growth, which is bottom-line and can be inflated by cost cutting or buybacks. Strong revenue growth with improving margins is a high-quality signal.
Debt-to-Equity: Debt-to-equity ratio compares total financial debt to shareholders' equity, expressed as a percentage. It measures the degree of financial leverage. Thresholds are sector-dependent — capital-intensive industries (utilities, REITs) typically run higher D/E than tech. High D/E increases sensitivity to rising interest rates and economic downturns.
Profit Margin: Profit margin is net income divided by total revenue, expressed as a percentage. It measures how much of each revenue dollar becomes profit after all expenses, taxes, and interest. Wide and expanding margins suggest pricing power and operational efficiency.
Return on Equity (ROE): Return on equity measures how much net income a company generates per dollar of shareholder equity. It is a proxy for capital efficiency and management quality. Values above 15% are generally considered strong; extremely high ROE can indicate high leverage rather than true operational outperformance.
Dividend Yield: Dividend yield is the annual dividend per share divided by the current share price, expressed as a percentage. It represents the cash return to shareholders from dividends alone, before capital appreciation. High yields (>5%) can signal income opportunity but may also reflect a depressed share price or an unsustainable payout.
Dividend Yield (TTM): The trailing-twelve-months (TTM) dividend yield is calculated by summing every dividend payment with an ex-date in the last 365 days and dividing by the latest share price. It is the most accurate backwards-looking measure of dividend income; the forward yield, in contrast, annualises the most recent payment.
Dividend Yield (Forward): The forward dividend yield projects the most recent dividend payment across a full year at the inferred frequency (e.g. quarterly → x4) and divides by current price. It reacts immediately to dividend changes — useful for newly-raised dividends — but assumes the company will sustain the rate.
Payout Ratio: The payout ratio is the share of net earnings paid out as dividends. A ratio below 60% generally signals a sustainable dividend with room for growth; above 80-100% is a warning that the payout may be at risk during downturns. REITs and utilities typically run higher payouts than the broad market.
5-Year Dividend CAGR: The 5-year dividend CAGR compares the trailing-12-month dividend total today to the trailing-12-month total five years ago, then annualises the growth. Companies that grow dividends every year for decades (Dividend Aristocrats / Kings) tend to have stable earnings and disciplined capital allocation.
Payout Frequency: Payout frequency is inferred from the median gap between recent ex-dates. Most US-listed dividend payers distribute quarterly. A few REITs and ETFs pay monthly; many international stocks pay semi-annually or annually. Frequency affects how forward yield is computed (last payment × payments-per-year).
Fear & Greed Index: The Fear & Greed Index is published by CNN Business and aggregates seven market indicators — stock price momentum, price strength, breadth, put/call ratio, junk bond demand, volatility (VIX) and safe-haven demand — into a single 0–100 sentiment score. Extreme fear readings (<25) have historically coincided with washed-out markets, extreme greed (>75) with frothy ones, but the index is a contrarian context signal, not a timing tool.
VIX: The VIX is computed by CBOE from S&P 500 option prices and represents the annualised 30-day volatility the options market is pricing in. It is often called the "fear gauge" because it spikes when investors pay up for downside protection. VIX is one of the inputs to the Fear & Greed Index and to the market conditions page.
Credit Spread (HY OAS): HY OAS (FRED series BAMLH0A0HYM2) is the option-adjusted spread of the ICE BofA US High Yield Index over the Treasury curve, published daily. Because it is priced by real credit-market participants (not a retail sentiment composite), it tends to lead equity market-conditions shifts and is one of the inputs the Market Conditions score already consumes (the HY-spread signal). “Tight / Normal / Stressed” on the dashboard card reflects the current level’s percentile within its own historical range, not a hand-picked absolute number — 4% can be tight in one credit cycle and stressed in another.
ATR (Average True Range): Average True Range measures a stock's typical daily range, accounting for overnight gaps, averaged over a trailing window (commonly 14 days). Unlike σ it is expressed directly in price terms, which makes a volatile stock's typical daily move directly comparable with a quiet one's, instead of relying on a one-size-fits-all percent.
Max Drawdown: Maximum drawdown is the largest percentage drop from a running peak to the subsequent trough. It captures the worst-case experience of holding through the period: a strategy can post a good total return and still have suffered a −40% drawdown along the way. Deep drawdowns are punishing because recovery is asymmetric — a 50% loss requires a 100% gain to break even.
S&P 500: The S&P 500 is a market-cap-weighted index of 500 large U.S. companies, widely used as the benchmark for the U.S. equity market.
GICS Sector: GICS (Global Industry Classification Standard), developed by MSCI and S&P Dow Jones Indices, groups public companies into 11 sectors, 24 industry groups and finer sub-levels. Quantustik's sector heatmap averages the equal-weighted realised return of each sector's scanned constituents — it is a breadth view (is the whole sector moving together?), not market-cap-weighted like the official S&P sector indices.
Yield Curve (10Y − 2Y): The yield curve spread is the 10-year minus 2-year Treasury yield. It normally slopes upward (positive); when it inverts (goes negative), longer-dated debt yields less than short-dated debt, historically a leading indicator of recession within 6–24 months, albeit with variable lag.
High-Yield Credit Spread: The high-yield credit spread is the extra yield ("option-adjusted spread") that junk-rated corporate bonds pay over comparable Treasuries. It widens when credit investors price in more default risk — a real-time gauge of financial stress that often leads equity drawdowns.
Initial Jobless Claims: Initial jobless claims count new applications for unemployment insurance each week. This signal tracks the 4-week moving-average change: a sustained rise signals labor-market softening, which historically precedes broader economic slowdowns and risk-off conditions.
Companies With Improving Finances: This checks the businesses under the prices: for each major S&P 500 company we compare the latest quarter of revenue with the one before it, and count how many are growing. Reading it is not "higher is always better" — a very low share means the economy is contracting (negative), the middle range means broad, sustainable growth (positive), and an unusually high share tends to mark a late-cycle peak that is hard to beat next quarter (contrarian-negative).
Market Breadth: Market breadth measures how many S&P 500 constituents are participating in a trend, here as the percentage trading above their 200-day moving average. A rally led by a narrow handful of mega-caps (weak breadth) is considered more fragile than one where most stocks are advancing together.
Sudden surge of stocks rising together: Martin Zweig's Breadth Thrust indicator fires when the 10-day advance ratio of NYSE issues swings from below 0.40 to above 0.615 — a rapid, broad-based buying surge. It is a rare, historically positive momentum signal rather than a everyday reading.
VIX Term Structure: VIX term structure compares 30-day implied volatility (VIX) to 3-month implied volatility (VIX3M). Normally VIX < VIX3M (contango, calm markets pricing more uncertainty further out). When it inverts into backwardation (ratio ≥ 1), near-term fear exceeds longer-term expectations — a classic acute-stress signature.
VIX Absolute Level: The raw VIX level, read as a contrarian gauge at its extremes: readings above 30 have historically coincided with panic-driven selling climaxes (often followed by a rebound, though not always), while readings below 15 suggest complacency that can precede volatility spikes.
Insider Cluster Buys: Insider cluster buys count how many S&P 500 companies had three or more distinct company insiders (officers/directors) file open-market purchases within the same 10-day window, per SEC Form 4 filings. Multiple insiders buying independently is a stronger signal than any single purchase.
Congressional Trading: Tracks the net dollar volume of stock trades disclosed by members of the U.S. Congress under the STOCK Act (buys minus sells), z-scored against its own trailing history so a reading can be compared across time. Congressional trades are lagged, self-reported disclosures — a supplementary signal, not real-time.
Analyst Upgrade/Downgrade Shift: Aggregates sell-side analyst rating changes across the S&P 500 over a trailing 30-day window into a single net shift: (upgrades − downgrades) / total actions. A positive shift means analysts are turning more constructive as a group; it is a lagging, consensus-following signal rather than a leading one.
Sector Rotation: Sector rotation compares the relative strength of defensive sectors (utilities, staples, healthcare) against cyclical sectors (discretionary, industrials, financials). Money flowing into defensives typically reflects a risk-off posture; flows into cyclicals typically reflect risk appetite returning.
Analyst price targets vs actual prices: Compares the median sell-side analyst price target to the current price across S&P 500 constituents. A large aggregate premium (targets well above price) reflects analyst optimism about further upside; a discount reflects pessimism. Analyst targets are known to lag price and skew positive, so this is read as a sentiment gauge rather than a prediction.
Big institutions adding or cutting positions: Institutional flow breadth is the share of S&P 100 tickers where the combined share count held by the 50 largest 13F filers increased quarter-over-quarter, from SEC 13F institutional-holdings filings (reported with a lag of up to 45 days). Read as a contrarian-U: moderate inflow breadth is positive confirmation, but very high breadth can indicate a crowded, one-sided positioning that is vulnerable to unwind.