New York Stock Exchange (NYSE)

These stalwarts of our financial institution (hey quit snickering) are only allowed on the New York Stock Exchange if they have shown consistent earnings over $5 million and have at lease 2 million shares available for trade.  Well heck, I’m pretty sure there’s some kids making that much off google ads, but who am I to set the standards.

NYSE stocks can be named using 1 letter like ATT (T), two letters like Boeing (BA) or three letter stock symbol like Lowes (LOW).

National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quote system (NASDAQ)

The NASDAQ has less requirements to get listed so your choices (regardless if you think this is a good thing or not) is much more varied on the NASDAQ.

NASDAQ stocks symbols have four letters to distinguish them from their NYSE counterparts.  Microsoft (MSFT) is an example of a NASDAQ stock symbol.  You tend to find some humorous names in the NASDAQ universe, I just don’t suggest you invest simply because of a catchy name, however there may be some trading strategies where that could be of assistance.

Options Listings

Options are named using a smart system to give you all the key information about the option in one naming string. 

First is the stock symbol exactly how you see the stock ticker if it’s 3 letters or less.  The four letter ones have a 3 letter variation.

The next part tells you the month and if it’s a call or put.  Here is the table of letters:

 So a Pepsi Put ending in May would look like this at this point: PEPQ

The final part of an option symbol is the strike price.  Here’s the table:

So if you had a Pepsi Put with an expiration in May with a strike price of 55 it would read as: PEPQK

Hopefully the alphabet soup is a little less confusing now.

Best of luck out there.  Keep up the stock market 101 learning.

Related posts:

  1. Indices Stock
  2. The Stock Market And The Ticker Tape

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