What does Pro Forma Mean? Pro forma is Latin for “as a matter of” or “for the sake of form.” It is used primarily in reference to the presentation of information in a formal way, assuming or forecasting pieces of information that may be unavailable. In most cases, pro forma documentation is used to present…
What is Time Period Bias? Time period bias is a sampling error caused by selecting observations that only cover a certain time period (i.e., a certain set of circumstances or factors). Time period bias may lead to inaccurate results since the conclusions obtained from using a sample suffering from the bias may be uniquely specific…
What is Survivorship Bias? Survivorship bias is a type of sample selection bias that occurs when a data set only considers “surviving” or existing observations and fails to consider observations that already ceased to exist. In finance, an example of survivorship bias is when studies on mutual fund returns only use databases that contain data…
What is Consignment? Before understanding the difference between consignor vs. consignee, it’s important to understand what consignment is. Consignment is the process by which a person gives over something to the care of another party, retaining full ownership until the property is sold. It is often done during auctions, shipping, transferring goods, or any time…
What is a Random Variable? A random variable (stochastic variable) is a type of variable in statistics whose possible values depend on the outcomes of a certain random phenomenon. Since a random variable can take on different values, it is commonly labeled with a letter (e.g., variable “X”). Each variable possesses a specific probability distribution function…
What is the Central Limit Theorem (CLT)? The Central Limit Theorem (CLT) is a statistical concept that states that the sample mean distribution of a random variable will assume a near-normal or normal distribution if the sample size is large enough. In simple terms, the theorem states that the sampling distribution of the mean approaches…
What is Statistics? Statistics is a term that is derived from the Latin word “status,” which means a group of figures that are used to represent information about a human interest. It refers to the technique that is developed for the purpose of collecting, reviewing, analyzing, and drawing conclusions from quantified data. The data obtained…
What is Kurtosis? Kurtosis is a statistical measure that defines how heavily the tails of a distribution differ from the tails of a normal distribution. In other words, kurtosis identifies whether the tails of a given distribution contain extreme values. Along with skewness, kurtosis is an important descriptive statistic of data distribution. However, the two…
What are Black Swan Events? In this article, we provide examples of black swan events as they relate to the financial industry. The financial markets are the context in which black swan events are most commonly referred to. In the investing world, a black swan event is an extremely negative event or happening that is…
