Bear
In Yellowstone, it means one thing. On Castro Street in San Francisco, it means another. But on Wall Street, a Bear is a Dour Dan, a Sad Sadly, a Negative Nancy. A bear believes that things will get worse, that the market will go down, and that the glass really is half empty and, uh...has germs on its rim.
So why a bear?
Because it's strong. And the sad backstory is that its counterpart, Positive Polly, is a bull. Bored (presumably stoned) miners in California used to pit the two animals against each other in a ring, and whoever won, well, more or less determined the future of the markets. It was that era's crystal ball, albeit with blood all over it. Think: Punxsutawney Phil with deadly powers. Where was PETA when we needed them?
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Finance: What's the Difference Between B...160 Views
Finance a la shmoop what's the difference between bear and bull? bear
pessimistic bad growly things coming Negative Nancy boo bear...Bull [Bear walking into water]
awesomesauce life's good you take it by the you know horns alright we're gonna
apply bear and bull to markets here but they apply to a whole lot of things and
a bear market is actually technical nomenclature that refers to sustained or [Bear market definition on 100 dollar bill]
prolonged periods of time where stock prices generally just fall...three
four five six seven eight quarters where the market craps the bed down down down
the bear market pattern is different from just a correction when the market
takes just a short term dump and then well you know quickly recovers yeah like [Bear market graph]
it has a bad quarter or two and then starts climbing again well that's not
the big bad bear that's just a correction a bull market is just the
opposite it goes up up up like this guy in his balloon-powered house and that's [House with balloons travels up a stock value graph]
it both are dangerous in the wild but on Wall Street huh you just have to watch
out for the Bears [Bear chasing a woman]
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