bear

Bear

An investor who believes a stock or the overall market will decline. A bear market is a prolonged period of falling stock prices, usually by 20% or more. Related: bull.

Bear

An investor who believes, for any technical or fundamental reason, that a security or the broader market will decline significantly. A bear takes the appropriate steps to limit losses during the period that they believe that the security will decline. They may sell their long positions or short sell the security to profit from the decline in price. See also: Bull.

bear

An investor who believes a security or some other asset or the security markets in general will follow a broad downward path. An investor can often be a bear on a particular security but not on the general market and vice versa. Compare bull.

bear

a person who sells a financial security (stock, share, foreign currency, etc.) in expectation that its market price is likely to fall. See SPECULATION. Compare BULL.

bear

a person who expects future prices in a STOCK EXCHANGE or COMMODITY MARKET to fall and who seeks to make money by selling shares or commodities. Compare BULL. See SPOT MARKET, FUTURES MARKET, BEAR MARKET.