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Earnings Per Share (EPS)
A portion of the company's earnings allocated to each share outstanding. Calculated by dividing the number of outstanding shares into earnings.

Earnings Yield
A company's per-share earnings expressed as a percentage of its stock price. This provides a yardstick for comparing stocks with bonds, as well as with other stocks.

EBIT
Earnings before interest and taxes. The figures are often used gauge the financial performance of companies with high levels of debt and interest expenses.

Economic Indicators
Key statistics used to analyze business conditions and make forecasts.

Emerging Markets
Financial markets in nations that are developing market-based economies and have become popular with U.S. investors, such as China and Peru.

Endorsement
In some forms of insurance, a provision added to a policy to add to or alter the coverage.

Equity
Assets minus liabilities.

Equity Security
Equity securities represent direct ownership in the issuing company. A person that owns $1000 worth of a companies stock owns $1000 worth of that company. Equity, however, is subordinate to debt. If a company goes bankrupt the holders of debt securities have claims senior to the equity owners.

Estate
A persons total worth including property and other assets, exclusive of liabilities.

Estate Taxes
Taxes levied by the federal and state governments on the transfer of your assets after you die. Uncle Sam levies estate taxes on the world-wide assets of both U.S. citizens and U.S. residents.

Eurocurrency
A deposit in a bank outside the depositor's country of origin. Most deposits are U.S. dollar deposits, although nearly all major Western currencies are represented.

Eurodollars
Dollar-denominated deposits in banks outside the U.S.

European Union (EU)
An intergovernmental organization of 12 Western European nations created under the Maastricht treaty of December 1991 with its own institutional structures and decision-making framework. Before the Maastricht treaty went into effect in November 1993, the organization was known as the European Community or the Common Market. Its members are Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom. Its council of ministers and the European Commission are based in Brussels, Belgium, and its parliament is based in Strasbourg, France.

Ex-dividend
A period of time immediately before a dividend is paid, during which new investors in the stock are not entitled to receive the dividend. A stock's price is revised lower to reflect the dividend value on the first day of this period. On that day, a stock is said to "go ex-dividend."

Executor
The person named in a will to handle the settlement of the estate.

Exercise Price
Price at which the stock or commodity underlying a call or put option can be purchased (call) or sold (put) over the specified period.

Expense Ratio
Amount, expressed as a percentage of total investment, that shareholders pay annually for mutual fund operating expenses and management fees. These fees include shareholder service, salaries for money managers and administrative staff, and investor centers. The expense ratio, which may be as low as 0.2% or as high as 2.0% of shareholder assets, is taken out of the fund's current income and is disclosed in the prospectus to shareholders.

Expiration Date
The date after which an option may no longer be exercised.

Export-Import Bank of the U.S. (EXIMBANK)
Bank set up by Congress in 1934 to encourage U.S. trade with foreign countries. The bank is financed by the Treasury Department.