arbitrage

arbitrage extract from Britannica Online.

Business operation involving the purchase of foreign currency, gold, financial securities, or commodities in one market and their almost simultaneous sale in another market, in order to profit from price differentials existing between the markets. In the 1980s a form of speculation called risk arbitrage arose, in which speculators tried to identify companies targeted for takeover and buy blocks of their stock, to be resold at a profit when the takeover was announced and the company's stock rose in value. See also insider trading; security.

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