abbreviation for Standard & Poor's Depositary Receipt, traded on the American Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol "SPY." Called "spiders," they are securities that represent ownership in a long-term unit investment trust that holds a portfolio of common stocks designed to track the performance of the S&P 500 index.
acronym for Standard & Poor's Depositary Receipt, traded on the American Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol "SPY." Called spiders, they are securities that represent ownership in a long-term Unit Investment Trust that holds a portfolio of common stocks designed to track the performance of the S&P 500 index. A SPDR entitles a holder to receive proportionate quarterly cash distributions corresponding to the dividends that accrue to the S&P 500 stocks in the underlying portfolio, less trust expenses. Like a stock, SPDRs can be traded continuously throughout the trading day, or can be held for the long-term. In contrast, S&P 500 index mutual funds are priced only once, at the end of each trading day. Amex also trades MidCap SPDRs, which track the S&P MidCap 400 index.
