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Definition

<p style="text-align: justify;">A term used to describe <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">listed</span> <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">shares</span> which trade in large <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">volumes</span> regularly and can be bought or sold freely on the <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">Securities</span> <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">Exchange</span>. You should be careful of shares which are "<span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">tightly held</span>" because you may have trouble finding a buyer or seller, and in particular you should not <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">short</span>-sell them as you will have difficulty covering your <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">position</span>. The <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">blue chip</span> shares in the JSE Top40 index and many in the <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">JSE Mid-cap index</span> are free-dealing. The big <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">institutions</span> (<span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">pension fund</span>s, <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">unit trusts</span> and <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">insurance companies</span>) can only <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">invest</span> in shares which are extremely free-dealing because of the size of their <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">portfolios</span>. Those shares are known as "<span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">institutional stocks</span>". <span class="glossary" style="border-bottom: 1px dotted black; cursor: pointer;">Private investors</span> on the other hand can optimise out of almost double the number of shares because their transactions are much smaller.</p>