
Bag holder stock is stock or securities sold to someone else at a high price. Then, the value of the stock suddenly drops. The person left with the stock is the bag holder and the security itself is considered bag holder stock.
What is a bag holder in investing?
Bag holder is an informal term used to describe an investor who holds a position in a security that drops in value until it is virtually worthless. Bag holders often succumb to the disposition effect or sunk cost fallacy, which causes them to cling to their positions for irrationally long periods.
Do you hold a bag holder?
A bag holder is a trader who stubbornly holds a stock despite pricing falling. They always seem to believe that it’ll go back up again. Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Prada, do you hold any of those? If so, does that make you a bag holder? If you’re a stock trader and have the wherewithal to unload your positions to afford a bag like that, likely not.
How do ‘bag holders’ lose money?
Bag holders tend to lose money by being the last owners of a failing investment. According to the website Urban Dictionary, the term “bag holder” hails from the Great Depression, where people on soup lines held potato bags filled with their only possessions. Since then, the term has emerged as part of modern-day investment lexicon.
Is there a “bag holder anonymous?
A blogger who writes on the subject of penny stock investing once quipped about starting a support group called “Bag Holders Anonymous.” A bag holder refers to an investor who symbolically holds a “bag of stock” that has become worthless over time. Suppose an investor purchases 100 shares of a newly public technology start-up.

How do you become a bag holder?
Suppose that you bought 100 shares of stock in a company priced at $50 per share with the plan to hold your shares for many years. Say the value of the company's shares then declined steadily for 10 years. If the stock does, in fact, become worthless, you would become a bag holder.
What is the usage of bag holder?
A bag holder is a financial slang used to describe an investor who holds on to poor-performing, or worthless, investments. Bag holders tend to stubbornly hold their losing investments for an extended period instead of cutting losses.
What does bag holder mean in Crypto?
This is a investor or trader who has been holding (or hodling) a particular cryptocurrency for too long and now has to face the consequences of that decision. In extreme cases, a bag holder has bought at a high and missed the opportunity to sell, leaving this person with worthless coins.
What are Tutes?
When the price of the stock goes up, the "tutes" -- institutional investors --have discovered your amazing biotech stock and are buying behind you to catch up. A rising stock price also means shorts are scared and covering before the inevitable, massive short squeeze runs them over.
How much money is considered a bag?
£1,000 is commonly referred to as a grand, e.g., £4,000 would be called 4 grand, or rarely in certain dialects as a "bag" (from the rhyming slang "Bag of Sand"), e.g., £4,000 would be called 4 bags.
What is a Variera used for?
The VARIERA is the perfect shape and size for a bathroom or mudroom. Hang one inside a cabinet to discretely to hold 4 rolls of toilet paper. You can also use them on their side to wrangle all sorts of cleaning products.
What does dropping a bag mean?
To put up or spend a lot of money. Example sentence: “We went to Cheesecake factory to drop a bag.” Drop a bag in songs: “Say he want smoke, drop a bag, everybody get shot” – Nav, Wolves.
What are diamond hands?
Per dictionary.com, “Diamond hands is a slang term for an investor who refrains from selling an investment despite downturns or losses.” That seems sensible. Novice investors are counseled not to be rattled by stock market slumps, but instead to stay the course.
What is a runner stock?
A runner is a junior employee on the floor of a securities exchange that transmits order information about trades to the appropriate destinations. While floor trading is giving way to electronic markets, runners still play a crucial role on the remaining trading pits.
What is a flush in trading?
2:546:46WHAT IS A FLUSH? - YouTubeYouTubeStart of suggested clipEnd of suggested clipSituation you just see many more so again it's the same attributes of many people trying to get outMoreSituation you just see many more so again it's the same attributes of many people trying to get out of the same trade at the same point in time and the market not really being able to accommodate.
What is a Wall Street trader called?
Individual traders, also called retail traders, often buy and sell securities through a brokerage or other agent.
Bag Holder Explained in Less Than 5 Minutes
Erin Gobler is personal finance coach and a writer with over decade of experience. She specializes in writing about investing, cryptocurrency, stocks, and more. Her work has been published on major financial websites including Bankrate, Fox Business, Credit Karma, The Simple Dollar, and more.
Definition and Example of a Bag Holder
A bag holder in investing is someone who holds a stock as its value declines. The term originates from the concept of being “left holding the bag,” meaning left responsible for something because others have abandoned responsibility. 1 2
How Does Bag Holding Work?
Bag holding occurs when an investor holds a stock as it declines in value and incurs losses rather than selling it off.
Bag Holding vs. Volatility
It’s important to make the distinction between bag holding and simply experiencing everyday stock market volatility. When someone is a bag holder, they’ve held a stock far longer than they probably should have, and it’s drastically declined in value in that time.
What It Means for Individual Investors
One of the risks of investing in the stock market is the risk that a company’s shares will decline in value, or even become worthless. No one can truly predict the future and say with certainty which companies will succeed and which will fail.
What is a bag holder?
A bag holder is a person who holds on to a stock all the way to $0 despite signs along the way that the stock needed to be sold. Bag holder stocks are also known as value traps, meaning that the stock seems like a value when in reality it is worthless.
How to avoid bag holder?
Of course, the best way to avoid becoming a bag holder is to skip the value traps in the first place. Stocks with loads of debt, no growth, and bad management can look like great values, but, usually, they aren't. Additionally, think long and hard about investing in a dead industry. For every Best Buy ( NYSE:BBY), there are 10 Circuit Cities.
What happens when you are enraptured with a value stock?
When you're so enraptured with a value stock that all new information confirms your prior beliefs even as the stock goes to zero, you become a bag holder.
What is confirmation bias?
With confirmation bias, all new information is filtered to confirm your prior opinions.
Can you see a future?
If you are wondering whether you are a bag holder or not, ask yourself the following questions.
What does it mean to be a bag holder?
Technically speaking, the term “bag holder” means that someone is stubbornly holding onto a stock that is slowly becoming worthless. However, many traders will use it to describe people who bought into a stock just before it crashed or underwent a correction.
What is a bag holder in stocks?
In stocks slang, a bag holder is an investor who owns shares that fell in price AND are unlikely to rebound anytime soon. For example, if you purchase shares in a company at $5 and the price crashes to $1, then other traders may refer to you as a bag holder. In other words, you are now holding a stock that is worth significantly less.
Is Visa a blue chip?
Because VISA is a blue chip stock with strong fundamentals and a bright future. Whereas random pharma company ABC is a stock-diluting dumpster fire that is teetering on the brink of extinction. Basically, Sandra’s shares are far more likely to recover and reach a new all-time high.
Where Does the Term Bag Holder Come From?
According to Urban Dictionary – yes, I occasionally refer to it – the term “bag holder” originates from the Great Depression. It was during this time that those in soup lines held their only possessions in potato bags. Over time the term has evolved and made it’s way to mainstream Wall Street. There’s even a blogger – not me – who proposed starting a support group called “Bag Holders Anonymous.”
What is a bag holder?
A bag holder is a term we use to describe someone who holds a “bag of stock,” decreasing in value over time. But it could be crypto, forex, or even bonds they are “holding” while price is steadily dropping. Ultimately depending on their stubbornness and, or stupidity, they hold it until it is worthless. Let me give you an example to illustrate.
What is the sunk cost fallacy?
In financial terms, a sunk cost is is a cost that has already been incurred and cannot be recovered. Economists would point out that the sunk cost fallacy is irrational and could be described as ” throwing good money after bad “.Unfortunately, it’s our tendency to continue to pursue something that we have already committed. This commitment can be in the form of money, time, or effort, even if the costs are not recoverable.
Why is it important to put systems in place?
Our minds can play many tricks on us, and that’s why it’s important to put systems in place to protect ourselves. Systems come in the form of trading plans, stop losses and risk management.
What is prospect theory?
Practically speaking, the prospect theory explains how people decide what they perceive to gain, not lose. We tend to place a greater value on avoiding losses because of the associated negative emotional impact.#N#Prospect theory shows how people react differently based on risk and uncertainty. For example, imagine gaining $1,000, then losing that same $1,000. Which causes a greater emotional reaction? You guessed it, losing the $1,000. Or, what about the choice to receive $50 or $100 but then lose half?
How to avoid being a hag holder?
If you want to avoid being a hag holder, you need to be patient with your trades. Don’t jump in just because everyone else is. That’s one of the most common ways people get stuck with the bag. Hello pump and dump penny stocks! What do the chart and fundamentals tell you? If you’re trading penny stocks, make sure the company has solid fundamentals so they don’t disappear and you’re stuck with shares you don’t want.
Can a bag holder forget to check their portfolio?
For starters, a bag holder may forget to check their portfolio, unaware of the fall in price. I guess that was me in the above example.
What Is Bag Holder Stock?
Bag holder stock is stock or securities sold to someone else at a high price. Then, the value of the stock suddenly drops. The person left with the stock is the bag holder and the security itself is considered bag holder stock . In other words, someone else is left holding the bag while the stock price plummets.
Bag Holder Stock & Value Investors
Value investors are more vulnerable to the threat of choosing a bag holder stock than other investing strategies. Buying value by its very definition entails purchasing out-of-favor firms. More often than not, it entails purchasing equities that have declined significantly in price.
Bag Holder Stock Psychology Profiles
Why do investors tend to hold on to losing investments? Many psychology studies have looked closely at this phenomenon. There are a few notable motivations of which investors should be aware.
Bag Holder Stock – Examples
In practice, there are usually indications or red flags that a security is a viable candidate for becoming a bag holder stock. For example, if a company’s share price is cyclical, meaning it fluctuates in response to economic shocks. Cyclicality presents a good possibility that riding out tough patches will result in a share price reversal.
Up Next: Credit Sweep – What Are Credit Sweeps in Corporate Finance?
A credit sweep in corporate finance is an arrangement with a bank to utilize idle funds to automatically pay down a line of credit or loan. Credit sweeps are typically contracts between a bank and a client, usually a corporation.
What is a bag holder?
A bag holder in regards to trading is someone who holds onto a position when it goes against them for an extended period of time causing large losses. This typically happens when a trader enters a position and it goes quickly against them and they freeze like a deer in headlights.
Why do traders hold onto losing positions?
There are a lot of reasons why traders will hold onto a losing position, but the main one is fear of losing. Nobody wants to be a loser. Not me, not you. It’s in our blood to want to be successful. So when trades go against us, we go against our better judgement and turn a losing trade into something much, much worse.
What is a bag holder?
A bag holder is someone who is holding one or multiple losing positions in stocks, and hasn’t sold. In trading, pride and stubbornness are two very costly traits. To become a professional trader, you have to get used to being wrong often. No one can win on every trade. For this reason, you always need to have an exit strategy if a stock goes ...
How to know if you are a bag holder?
If you are a bag holder, you will never be able to make a living trading stocks. Here are 3 signs you are a bag holder: 1. Holding Big Losing Positions. If you currently own any stocks where you are down 20% or more on your position for multiple months, you are a bag holder. There is no reason to ever be down this much on an investment.
Why do bag holders care about money?
Bag holders care more about being right than making money. They think that as long they don’t sell, it doesn’t count as a loss. The whole point of investing in the first place is to turn money into more money. Who cares about being right. Even if you really believe in a company’s fundamentals, it does not mean you should buy shares of the stock. There is more to making money in the stock market than just buying companies with good fundamentals.

Definition and Example of A Bag Holder
- A bag holder in investing is someone who holds a stock as its value declines. The term originates from the concept of being “left holding the bag,” meaning left responsible for something because others have abandoned responsibility.12 For an example of a bag holder, you can look to any company that once seemed like a good investment but has since p...
How Does Bag Holding Work?
- Bag holding occurs when an investor holds a stock as it declines in value and incurs losses rather than selling it off. Suppose the stock has reached $10 per share, which is just 20% of the stock price when you bought it. If you sold the stock for a considerable loss, say at $10 per share or just 20% of the stock price, or if the stock’s price rebounded, you would not be considered a bag hold…
Bag Holding vs. Volatility
- It’s important to make the distinction between bag holding and simply experiencing everyday stock market volatility. When someone is a bag holder, they’ve held a stock far longer than they probably should have, and it’s drastically declined in value in that time. Not everyone who sees their stock holdings lose value would be considered a bag holder. Consider someone who boug…
What It Means For Individual Investors
- One of the risks of investing in the stock market is the risk that a company’s shares will decline in value, or even become worthless. No one can truly predict the future and say with certainty which companies will succeed and which will fail. Perhaps one reason why investors end up “holding the bag” is that one piece of common investment advice is to buy low and sell high. However, that a…
Am I Really A Bag Holder?
Can You See A Future?
- If you are wondering whether you are a bag holder or not, ask yourself the following questions. 1. Does the company have a future? 2. Why did I invest in this stock in the first place? 3. Are the company’s fundamentals solid? 4. Is the company growing? 5. Is there a logicalreason why the stock might rebound at some stage? If you are struggling to find positive answers for the questi…
“These Bags Are heavy.”
- If a trader says that their “bags are heavy”, it means that they are “bag holding” shares in a company or crypto coin that they are eager to get rid of. In other words, they jumped into the stock at a high price, just before it fell. As a result, they are now (impatiently) waiting and hoping that it will rebound. However, the urge to sell and cut t...