980 Glossary 
Stop-Limit Order: similar to a stop order, the stop-limit order becomes a limit 
order, rather than a market order, when the security trades at the price specified 
on the stop. See also Stop Order. 
Straddle: the purchase or sale of an equal number of puts and calls having the same 
terms. 
Strangle: a combination involving a put and a call at different strikes with the same 
expiration date. 
Strategy: with respect to option investments, a preconceived, logical plan of position 
selection and follow-up action. 
Striking Price: see Exercise Price. 
Striking Price Interval: the distance between striking prices on a particular under­
lying security. For stocks, the interval is normally 2.5 points for lower-priced stocks 
and 5 points for higher-priced stocks. For indices, the interval is either 5 or 10 
points. For futures, the interval is often as low as one or two points. 
Structured Product: a combination of securities and possibly options into a single 
security that behaves like stock and trades on a listed stock exchange. Structured 
products are created by many of the largest financial institutions (banks and bro­
kerage firms). Many of the more popular ones are known by their acronyms, cre­
ated by the institutions that issued them: MITTS, TARGETS, BRIDGES, LINKS, 
DINKS, ELKS, and PERCS. See also PERCS. 
Subindex: see Narrow-Based. 
Suitable: describing a strategy or trading philosophy in which the investor is operat­
ing in accordance with his financial means and investment objectives. 
Support: a term in technical analysis indicating a price area lower than the current 
price of the stock, where demand is thought to exist. Thus, a stock would stop 
declining when it reached a support area. See also Resistance. 
Synthetic Put: a strategy constructed by shorting the underlying instrument and 
buying a call. The resulting position has the same profit and loss characteristics as 
a long put option. 
Synthetic Stock: an option strategy that is equivalent to the underlying stock. A long 
call and a short put is synthetic long stock. A long put and a short call is synthetic 
short stock. 
Technical Analysis: the method of predicting future stock price movements based 
on observation of historical stock price movements.