Akademik

n.

The anguish experienced by an investor who owns equities and who sees the value of their portfolio diminish when the stock market goes down (cf. sticker shock).

Maybe it was cool-headed professionalism or perhaps it was some weird form of combat fatigue that might someday become a part of the American lexicon of psychological ailments, under the heading "ticker shock" or "Apocalypse Dow."

But Monday evening, as Milwaukee's financial centers exhaled their bear-clawed bankers, brokers and deal-makers, the buzz around town was generally low-key.

—Crocker Stephenson, "Adjustment' doesn't dismay bar-going traders," Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, October 28, 1997

The long-shot Democratic contender was not selling short in anticipation of the wake on Wall Street. Rather, Gore was searching for political portfolio insurance: reliable information about the direction of the markets. All presidential candidates were similarly affected by ticker shock during a dizzying week in which requests for quotes sent aides scurrying after the Dow Jones industrial average rather than Bartlett's.

—Walter Shapiro, "Suffering from Ticker Shock," Time Magazine, November 2, 1987