The stock market, from zero

Imagine a pizza shop worth $100,000. The owner cuts its ownership into 100 equal slices and sells you 1. You now own 1% of the shop. You are entitled to 1% of what is left over after the shop pays its bills, and if the shop is sold one day, 1% of the sale price. That is all a stock is. A stock (also called a share or an equity) is a small piece of ownership in a company. Big companies work the same way, just with far more slices. A company might have 1 billion shares. Owning 100 of them makes you a very small part-owner of a real business with real employees, products and profits.

Companies need money to build factories, hire people and grow. They can borrow it (debt) or sell slices of ownership (equity). Selling shares has one big advantage: the company never has to pay the money back. The cost is that the original owners now share the future profits with new owners. The first time a company sells shares to the public is called an IPO, short for initial public offering. After that, the shares trade between investors on an exchange (a regulated marketplace for shares). The company only receives money in the IPO, or in later share sales. When you buy shares from another investor, your money goes to that investor, not to the company.

There are two ways. The first is a dividend: a cash payment a company may send to shareholders out of its profits, often every three months. Many young, fast-growing companies pay none and reinvest everything. Dividends are never guaranteed, and a company can cut them. The second is price growth. If the business becomes more valuable, other investors will pay more for a slice, so you can sell for more than you paid. Add the two together and you get total return.

A $500 share is not necessarily a bigger company than a $10 share. What matters is price times the number of shares. That total is called market capitalization, or market cap: the price the market puts on the whole company. A stock split changes the number of slices, not the size of the pie. In a 2-for-1 split, you hold 100 shares at $50 ($5,000) and end up with 200 shares at $25 ($5,000). Nothing about the business changed.

Earnings are a company's profit. Earnings per share (EPS) is profit divided by the number of shares. A common yardstick is the P/E ratio (price-to-earnings): price divided by EPS. It tells you how many dollars investors pay for each $1 of yearly profit.

That example shows why prices move: they depend on actual earnings and on expectations of future earnings. A company can report record profit and still fall if investors hoped for more. Interest rates matter too. When rates rise, safe savings pay more and a company's borrowing costs go up, so investors usually pay less for future profits. When rates fall, the reverse tends to happen. Market watchers use animal shorthand. A bull market is a long period of rising prices; a bear market is typically described as a fall of 20% or more from a recent high. A bull is optimistic, a bear is pessimistic. Both are normal, and over short periods prices are noisy and hard to predict.

An exchange is a regulated marketplace where shares are bought and sold under shared rules. In the US the big ones are the NYSE (New York Stock Exchange) and Nasdaq. In Canada the main one is the TSX (Toronto Stock Exchange). Regular trading hours at all three are typically 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Eastern time on weekdays, with extended pre-market and after-hours sessions at many brokers, where trading is thinner and prices can jump around more. You do not trade on an exchange directly. A broker (a licensed firm that places trades for you) sends your order in. On the other side, market makers are firms that continuously offer to both buy and sell a stock, which keeps trading smooth. They earn a tiny gap between their buying and selling prices, and in return there is almost always someone ready to trade with you in a big, popular stock.

Every stock has two prices at any moment. The bid is the highest price a buyer is currently willing to pay. The ask (or offer) is the lowest price a seller is willing to accept. The difference is the spread. You buy at the ask and sell at the bid.

1. You enter the stock, the number of shares and the order type in your broker's app.
2. The broker checks you have enough cash and sends the order to an exchange or to a market maker.
3. The order is matched with a seller at a price that fits your instructions.
4. You get a confirmation showing the number of shares and the price. In your account, the shares now show as yours.
5. The trade settles: cash and shares are formally exchanged behind the scenes.

Settlement is that final exchange. In both the US and Canada, most stock trades now settle one business day after the trade, called T+1 (trade date plus one day). You can usually sell shares right after buying them; the broker handles the timing. Commissions (the fee a broker charges per trade) are zero at many brokers for regular stock trades, while others charge a flat fee per trade. Always check the fee schedule, including currency conversion fees if you buy US stocks with Canadian dollars, or the reverse. Short selling, in brief: it is betting that a price will fall. The short seller borrows shares, sells them now, and hopes to buy them back later at a lower price to return them. The profit is the drop in price, minus borrowing costs. The danger is that a price can rise without limit, so a loss on a short can be larger than the money put in. It is an advanced tool, mentioned here so that news about it makes sense.

Most stocks tend to rise and fall together because they share the same background. The biggest forces are interest rates, set indirectly by central banks: the Federal Reserve (the Fed) in the US and the Bank of Canada. Higher rates make borrowing costlier and make safe savings more attractive, which usually weighs on stock prices. Lower rates tend to help. The economy matters too. A recession (a period when the economy shrinks, with falling spending and rising unemployment) squeezes company profits. And news, from elections to wars to surprise inflation numbers, can shift the whole market's mood in a day.

An index is a list of stocks used to measure how a market, or part of it, is doing. It is not something you can buy directly. It is a number. When news says 'the market fell 1% today', they usually mean an index such as the S&P 500. Each index is built differently, as the table shows. The Dow counts a $400 share as four times as influential as a $100 share, whatever the size of the companies, which is why professionals tend to prefer the S&P 500 as a gauge of the US market. The TSX Composite is more concentrated in a few sectors than the S&P 500, so it can behave quite differently. Because you cannot buy an index itself, you buy a fund that holds the stocks in it. One purchase gives you a slice of hundreds of companies. Many funds track the S&P 500 or the TSX Composite, and the funds' prices rise and fall with the index, minus their fees.

An ETF (exchange-traded fund) is a fund whose shares trade on an exchange like a stock. A mutual fund is a pool of investors' money run by a manager; it is priced once a day after the market closes. Both give instant diversification. In Canada the yearly fee is often called the MER (management expense ratio); in the US it is the expense ratio. The idea is the same: a percentage of your holdings taken each year to run the fund. An index ETF holds the stocks in an index and tries to match it. If the index rises 10%, the ETF should rise about 10%, less its small fee. Because there is no manager picking stocks, there is little trading and so the costs stay low. When comparing funds, look at the expense ratio, the size of the fund, and what index it tracks.

A fee of 1% sounds trivial. It is not, because it comes out every year, forever, and also costs you the growth that money would have earned. Compare two index-style funds that earn the same before fees.

An actively managed fund pays professionals to pick stocks and try to beat the market. A passive fund simply copies an index and makes no attempt to beat it. Active funds cost more because of the research and trading. The catch is that beating the market year after year is very hard. The long-running SPIVA reports, which compare active funds against their benchmark indexes, have repeatedly found that a majority of active funds trail their benchmark over periods of 10 years or more. Some do win, but it is hard to know in advance which. This is the main reason many people choose low-cost index funds.

Diversification means spreading money across many holdings so that one failure does not wreck you. A single company can go bankrupt, but it is unlikely that 500 companies in different industries do so at once. Diversification works best across industries (banks, energy, technology, health care, consumer goods), across company sizes, and across countries. Canadian investors, for example, often hold both Canadian and US stocks, because the TSX is weighted toward only a few sectors.

A broker is the company through which you buy and sell. There is no single best one; the right choice depends on what you need. Before opening an account, check these things.

• Regulation: the broker should be registered with the main regulators, such as FINRA and the SEC in the US, or CIRO in Canada. Regulators publish lookup tools where you can verify a firm.
• Investor protection: in the US, SIPC; in Canada, CIPF. These protect you if the broker itself fails, up to a limit (check the current limit). They do not protect you from losing money because prices fell.
• Costs: trade commissions, fund fees, currency conversion, account fees.
• Accounts offered: whether the broker supports the tax-advantaged accounts you want.
• Simplicity: an app you can understand, and real customer support.

Governments offer special accounts that cut or defer tax on investments. These are called tax-advantaged accounts. Everything else is a taxable account, where you may owe tax on dividends and on gains when you sell.

In Canada, the TFSA (Tax-Free Savings Account) and RRSP (Registered Retirement Savings Plan) are the main ones. In the US, the 401(k) (usually through an employer) and the IRA (Individual Retirement Account) are common. Each has different rules, limits and tax treatment, and rules and limits change, so check current ones with the government or a qualified professional. If an employer matches contributions in a retirement plan, that match is typically worth capturing. A tax-advantaged account is a container, not an investment. Putting money in a TFSA or IRA does not buy anything until you choose what to buy inside it.

Stocks can fall 30% just when you need cash. So first, build an emergency fund: savings you can reach quickly, often suggested at three to six months of essential expenses. Second, deal with high-interest debt, because it grows as surely as stock returns are uncertain.

You can start with very little. Many brokers allow fractional shares (a part of a share), so $50 can buy a slice of a stock or fund. A common approach is to invest a fixed amount on a schedule, such as $100 a month, which is called dollar-cost averaging. You buy more shares when prices are low and fewer when high. It does not guarantee profit, but it removes the pressure of picking a perfect moment. Paper trading means practicing with pretend money in a simulator. It is a good way to learn how to place orders and see how prices jump around, without risk. Treat it as practice for the mechanics, not proof of skill: it lacks the fear you feel when real money drops.

• Guaranteed returns. No real investment can guarantee profits. Be wary of any promise of 'no risk' or 'double your money'.
• Pressure to act now. Scammers create urgency. Real opportunities do not vanish in an hour.
• Unsolicited contact. Strangers on social media, dating apps or messaging groups offering tips or 'platforms' are a classic route to fraud.
• Pump-and-dump schemes. Promoters hype a tiny, obscure stock to push its price up, then sell their own shares and leave you holding the loss.
• Impersonation. Fake brokers, fake 'regulators' and fake support staff. Verify any firm on the regulator's official lookup, typing the address yourself.
• Requests to move money to a person, or to buy gift cards or crypto to 'unlock' your account. Real brokers do not ask for this.

1. Week 1: List your debts and their interest rates. Check how much emergency savings you have.
2. Week 1: Set a goal for the emergency fund and pay down any high-interest debt.
3. Week 2: Compare two or three regulated brokers on fees, accounts offered and ease of use. Check each on the regulator's lookup.
4. Week 2: Look up the current rules and limits for the tax-advantaged accounts available to you.
5. Week 3: Open the account. Try paper trading for a few days to learn how orders work.
6. Week 3: Decide on a simple plan: how much per month, and into what, such as one broad low-cost index fund. Write it down.
7. Week 4: Make a first small purchase, or set up an automatic monthly one. Check the fees on your confirmation.
8. Week 4: Turn off price alerts you do not need, and plan to review once or twice a year rather than daily.

A share of stock is a small slice of ownership in a real business. So the sensible question is: what is the whole business worth? The honest answer is the cash it will produce for its owners over the years ahead, adjusted for the fact that money later is worth less than money today. Everything else in this chapter (earnings, ratios, multiples) is a shortcut for estimating that.

Four plain words first. Revenue (also called sales) is the money customers pay the company. Earnings (also called net income or profit) is what is left after every cost, interest and tax. A margin is a profit measured as a share of revenue: a 10% net margin means 10 cents of profit from each dollar of sales. Free cash flow is the real cash left after the company pays to run and maintain itself, the money that could be handed to owners or used to grow. Profit is an accounting opinion; cash is a fact.

Every public company reports three documents. Here is a tiny fictional business, Maple Lane Bakery Inc., with 100,000 shares, so the numbers stay small enough to check by hand. All figures are in dollars.

How to read them together: the income statement says Year 2 profit rose from 97,500 to 120,000. The balance sheet says equity grew by 90,000, which is the 120,000 profit minus the 30,000 dividend. The cash-flow statement says only 80,000 of free cash was left, because 100,000 went into new ovens. Profit of 120,000 but free cash of 80,000 is normal for a growing business, and a good habit is to always compare the two.

A multiple means nothing alone. Compare it with the same company's past, with similar businesses, and with how fast the business is growing. A P/E of 15 can be cheap for a firm growing profits 12% a year and expensive for one that is shrinking. Growth investors pay up for fast-growing profits; value investors look for steady businesses priced below what the cash flows justify. Both want the same thing, more cash for less price. Neither style wins every decade.

Estimates of a business's worth are fuzzy, because the future is. The margin of safety idea, long taught by value investors, is to only buy when the price is well below your estimate, so errors do not sink you.

Money kept in an insured bank account is very safe and earns little. Stocks have historically earned more over long periods, but the path is bumpy and nothing is guaranteed. The extra return is the pay you demand for putting up with the bumps. If a high return came with no risk, everyone would pile in and the price would rise until the return disappeared.

Volatility is how much a price swings up and down. A stock that falls 20% and recovers has been volatile but has not cost you anything unless you sold. Permanent loss is when the money is gone for good: the company fails, or you paid so much that the business never grows into the price, or you sell at the bottom. A broad basket of hundreds of companies has historically recovered from every crash so far, but individual companies have gone to zero and some never come back. Past recovery is not a promise of future recovery. A drawdown is the fall from a previous high to a later low, and recovering from one is harder than falling into it.

Diversification means owning many different investments so that one failure cannot sink you. Correlation is how closely two investments move together. Two investments that rise and fall at the same time have high correlation and give you little protection. Two that tend to move independently, or in opposite directions, smooth the ride. The goal is not a higher return. It is a similar return with fewer nasty surprises.

Asset allocation is how you divide money among the big categories. Stocks (ownership) have higher expected returns and bigger swings. Bonds (loans to governments or companies that pay interest) usually swing less but can still lose value, especially when interest rates rise. Cash is steady but its buying power erodes with inflation. Time horizon, the number of years until you need the money, decides the mix: money needed next year should not be exposed to a stock-market drop, while money for retirement in 30 years has time to recover from one. Your tolerance matters too: an allocation you abandon in a panic is the wrong one.

Compounding means your gains start earning gains of their own. Simple interest pays only on the original amount. Compound growth pays on the growing total.

The cost of waiting is steep because the biggest growth comes at the end. With the same 10,000 at 7%, 20 years gives about 38,697, while 30 years gives about 76,123. Waiting ten extra years before starting cuts the final amount roughly in half. That does not mean rush in with money you may need soon. It means time is the one ingredient you cannot buy back.

Markets are hard, but most of the damage investors do to themselves is simple. People buy when everything feels great, sell when everything feels terrible, and trade more than is good for them. This is not stupidity. These habits come from how human brains evolved, which is why they feel so natural and so convincing in the moment. The fix is not willpower in the heat of the moment. It is rules written down while calm.

There is good evidence this matters. Researchers such as Morningstar, in their regular studies of investor returns, have typically found that the average dollar invested in a fund earned somewhat less than the fund itself reported. The gap comes from the timing of when people buy and sell, usually adding money after strong runs and pulling out after drops. The size of the gap varies by year and fund type, so treat it as a pattern rather than a precise number: even the same fund can pay different people very different results depending on when they act.

Pilots use checklists because stress makes smart people skip steps. A short written checklist before every trade slows you down just enough for your calm brain to catch up with your excited one. If you cannot answer an item, that is your answer: do not trade.

1. What is this business, and how does it make money? Can I explain it in two sentences to a friend?
2. What is the reason I am buying, written in one sentence, that has nothing to do with the price going up?
3. What do I think it is worth, and what is the price today? Is there a margin of safety?
4. What is the best argument against buying, and how likely is it?
5. How much of my total money is this, and how much could I lose? Could I stomach it falling 50%?
6. At what point, or on what news, would I decide I was wrong and sell? Written down now, before I own it.
7. Is this money I will not need for years?
8. Am I buying because of fear of missing out or advice from someone who gains if I trade?

There are three broad ways to take part in the stock market, and they are different activities with different odds. Index investing means buying a fund that holds hundreds or thousands of companies, matching the market rather than trying to beat it. Stock picking means choosing individual companies you think are worth more than their price and holding them for years. Active trading means buying and selling frequently, over days, weeks or months, to profit from price moves.

On taxes: rules differ by country and change over time, so check the current ones. In the US, profits on assets held over a year are generally taxed at lower long-term rates than those held less. In Canada, only a portion of a capital gain (currently one half) is added to taxable income. Both countries offer accounts that shelter investments from tax (for example, the 401(k) and IRA in the US, the TFSA and RRSP in Canada), and using them well can matter more than almost any stock decision.

Large, repeated studies of professional fund managers, such as the SPIVA reports that compare funds to their benchmark indexes, have consistently found that over long periods, most actively managed funds trail a comparable index after fees. Some beat it in any given year, but few keep doing so, and it is hard to tell skill from luck in advance. If trained professionals with research teams struggle, a casual picker should be realistic about the odds. This is not a law of nature, and some people do succeed, but it is the reason many investors keep the core of their money in index funds.

Costs matter more than they look. On 100,000, a yearly fee of 0.1% is 100 and a fee of 1% is 1,000. That 900 difference comes out every year and also stops compounding. Active trading adds spreads (the gap between buy and sell prices), possible commissions and taxes, so the trader must earn more than the index just to break even.

Position sizing means deciding how much money to put in one stock. The most common safeguard is to risk only a small, fixed share of your account on any idea, so a string of wrong calls cannot ruin you. You choose a price at which you will admit you were wrong (an exit point), measure how far that is below your entry, and work backwards.

A stock market does not move in a straight line. It climbs for a while, falls for a while, and then does both again. Traders have names for the two moods. A bull market is a period when prices rise broadly, usually after a rise of 20% or more from a low. A bear market is a period when prices fall broadly, usually defined as a drop of 20% or more from a recent peak. A smaller drop of 10% to 20% is called a correction. Think of the sea. There are tides (the long-run direction), waves (months of rising and falling) and ripples (daily noise). Bulls and bears are the big waves. They have no timetable. Bull markets tend to last for years and bear markets for months to a couple of years, but those are loose averages, and every cycle breaks the pattern in some way.

Why do booms and busts happen? Prices reflect what investors expect about future profits. In a boom, rising prices attract more buyers, who often borrow, which pushes prices higher still, and optimism feeds on itself. A bust starts when expectations break: profits disappoint, borrowing becomes costly or a shock arrives. Then the same loop runs backwards. Prices overshoot upwards in good times and downwards in bad times, and nobody can reliably say in advance where the turn will come.

1. 1929-32Heavy borrowing to buy shares, then bank failures and the Great Depression. The market fell roughly 85% over almost three years.
2. 1987On 19 October ('Black Monday') the S&P 500 fell roughly 20% in a single day. Peak to trough, the fall was roughly a third, over about three months.
3. 2000-02The dot-com bust. Prices of internet companies had risen far beyond their profits. The S&P 500 fell roughly half; technology-heavy indexes fell far more.
4. 2007-09The housing and banking crisis. Roughly 57% down from the October 2007 peak to the March 2009 low.
5. 2020The pandemic shock. A fall of roughly a third in about a month, one of the fastest on record, then an equally fast rebound.
6. 2022Inflation surged and central banks raised interest rates quickly. The S&P 500 fell roughly a quarter, and bonds fell too, which is unusual.

Over long stretches in the US, stocks have earned the most, bonds less, and cash the least. The numbers below are rough ranges for the period since the 1920s. They are averages across very different decades, not a forecast, and Canadian figures are broadly similar. Canadian investors lived through the same episodes. The Canadian market fell sharply in 2008 and in 2020 as well, and it leans heavily on banks, energy and mining, so its path differs from the US market even when the headlines match. Bonds are loans, so they pay interest and usually swing less than stocks. Cash means short-term savings such as treasury bills or a savings account, which barely move but struggle to beat inflation over decades.

• The sample is small. There have been only a handful of big crashes, so 'it always recovers' rests on very few cases.
• The US is the winner we can see. Other markets did worse. Japan's Nikkei 225 peaked in late 1989 and took until early 2024 to pass that level.
• Averages hide decades. US stocks were roughly flat across 2000-2009, and long bonds have had long stretches of losses.
• The cause of the next fall will be different. Each crash looked obvious afterwards and unthinkable before.

An interest rate is the price of borrowing money. Central banks, such as the Federal Reserve in the US and the Bank of Canada, set a short-term policy rate that sets the tone for all other rates. When that rate rises, loans cost more and safe savings pay more. That changes the value of almost everything, including stocks. Here is why, in plain words. A share is a claim on future profits. Money you get in the future is worth less than money you get today, because today's money could earn interest. The higher the interest rate, the more future money gets 'discounted', meaning marked down to what it is worth now.

Rates also act through the real economy. Higher rates raise mortgage and business loan costs, so people and companies spend less, profits cool and stocks can fall. Lower rates do the reverse. Central banks raise rates to cool inflation and cut them to support growth.

A yield is the annual return a bond pays, quoted as a percent. The yield curve is a line plotting yields on government bonds from short (3 months) to long (10 or 30 years). Normally longer loans pay more, so the line slopes up. Sometimes short rates exceed long rates; the curve is then 'inverted'. Inversions have come before many past US recessions, which is why headlines mention them, but the gap between signal and recession has been long and uneven, and it has never been a reliable timer for selling or buying.

Inflation is the general rise in prices over time. A return only matters after inflation, which is the real return. The quick estimate is nominal return minus inflation; the exact way is (1 + nominal) / (1 + inflation) - 1.

Company profits (earnings) rise in good times and fall in recessions. Stock prices usually move before the economy does, because investors price in what they expect months ahead. That is why the stock market is not the economy. In 2020 the market fell about a third in a month and was back to its old high by summer while many people were still out of work, because it was looking past the lockdown. A note for Canadians: the main Canadian index is heavy in banks, energy and mining, all fairly cyclical, while US indexes carry a large share of technology. The two markets can differ for years, which is one reason investors often hold both.

• Ask for the percent, not the points.
• Ask over what period. One day is noise; one decade is signal.
• Ask whether it changes your plan: your goal, your time horizon, your need for the money.
• Remember that headlines explain moves after the fact, and confident explanations are often guesses.
• Check whether the story is about the whole market or one company or sector.

Most investing mistakes are not about picking the wrong stock. They are about behaviour: buying after a big rise because it feels safe, and selling after a big fall because it feels unbearable. A written plan, made while you are calm, is a letter from your calm self to your panicking self. This chapter is education, not personal advice. It shows the parts of a plan and the trade-offs. The right numbers depend on your life, your country's tax rules and your own situation.

• Goal: what the money is for (a home deposit, retirement, a child's education). Each goal gets its own timeline.
• Time horizon: when you will need the money. Money needed in 2 years should not sit in assets that can fall 30% in a year. Money needed in 30 years can ride out several bear markets.
• Risk tolerance: how much of a fall you can sit through without selling. Two parts: ability (can your life absorb it?) and willingness (can you sleep?).
• Asset allocation: how you split money between stocks, bonds and cash. This choice drives most of the ups and downs.
• Accounts: where the money sits. In the US, examples are a 401(k), an IRA or a Roth IRA. In Canada, a TFSA, an RRSP or an FHSA. Rules on tax and withdrawals differ, so read your own country's rules.

Dollar-cost averaging (DCA) means investing the same dollar amount at regular intervals, such as every payday, whatever the price. When prices are low your money buys more units; when high, fewer. It also removes the need to guess the right day.

• Sell with a reason. Reasons that usually make sense: you need the money for the goal; your goal is near and you are moving to safer assets; rebalancing; a single company has changed in a way that breaks your reason for owning it; you need to fix too much money in one holding. Reasons that usually do not: a scary headline, a price drop on its own, a friend's tip.
• Before: write down in advance what you will do if your portfolio falls 20%, 35% and 50%.
• During: do nothing for 48 hours. Check your plan. Is the goal or the time horizon different? If not, the plan stands.
• Keep an emergency fund in cash (often 3 to 6 months of expenses), so you are never forced to sell shares in a fall.
• Keep investing on schedule if you can: units are cheaper in a fall. Do not borrow to do it.
• Do not check your balance daily. Look on a set date, such as once a quarter.

• My goals and their dates: ________
• Time horizon for each goal: ________
• Money I must keep in cash (emergency fund and goals due in under 3 years): ________
• The largest fall in dollars I can accept without selling: ________
• Target split between stocks, bonds and cash: ________ / ________ / ________
• Where the money is held (account types): ________
• How much I invest and how often: ________ every ________
• Rebalancing rule (date or drift): ________
• I will sell only if: ________
• In a crash I will: ________
• Things I will not do (borrow to invest, chase tips, trade on headlines): ________
• Review date, once a year: ________

1. Month 1: Read your account's fee page. Find the fees on every fund you own or consider.
2. Month 2: Learn how an index is built and what an index fund holds.
3. Month 3: Write your first investing policy using the template above.
4. Month 4: Read an annual report for a company you know. Find revenue, profit and debt.
5. Month 5: Learn how your own account types are taxed.
6. Month 6: Track how a paper portfolio behaves through some ups and downs.
7. Month 7: Study one past crash in detail (2000-02 or 2008) and what people felt.
8. Month 8: Learn about bonds: price, yield and what happens when rates change.
9. Month 9: Review your policy. Has your life changed?
10. Month 10: Learn how to read a company's balance sheet.
11. Month 11: Read about behavioural traps: overconfidence, loss aversion, herding.
12. Month 12: Rebalance if needed, update the policy and set next year's plan.

Every field has its own language, and that language can make beginners feel locked out. Here are 50 terms, in four groups. Each row has a number so you can count them as you go. Most of them appear earlier in this course.