gather in the stops

Gather in the stops

A market strategy in which investors sell stocks to drive prices to a level that breaks through stop orders known to exist. Once the price is low enough, the stop orders become market orders and are executed, to create snowballing.

Copyright © 2012, Campbell R. Harvey. All Rights Reserved.

Gather in the Stops

An investment strategy in which traders sell a security in large quantities such that it lowers the price in order to trigger stop orders. When the stop orders are triggered, more shares are sold, which triggers more stop orders, and the cycle continues. One may do this in order to drive the price down so that one may buy the security back at an artificially low price. However, if gathering in the stops runs out of control, an exchange may suspend stop orders for that security.

Farlex Financial Dictionary. © 2012 Farlex, Inc. All Rights Reserved

gather in the stops

To sell shares in order to drive down the price of a stock to a level that will activate stop orders that place additional downward price pressure on the stock.

Wall Street Words: An A to Z Guide to Investment Terms for Today's Investor by David L. Scott. Copyright © 2003 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. All rights reserved.