Beta

Beta measures how much a stock tends to move relative to the overall market — above 1.0 means more volatile than the market, below 1.0 means less.

Beta is a measure of a stock’s sensitivity to movements in the broad market. A beta of 1.0 means the stock has historically moved roughly in line with the market; 1.5 means it tended to move 1.5× as much (up and down); 0.6 means it was less reactive than the market. Negative betas — stocks that move opposite the market — are rare.

Beta is a backward-looking, statistical measure of one kind of risk (co-movement with the market), not a forecast and not a measure of a company’s business quality. A low-beta stock is not automatically "safe," and a high-beta one is not automatically "bad" — they simply carry different sensitivity to market swings.

A beta is only meaningful alongside the choices that produced it. Where we compute one, it is the slope of the company’s daily returns regressed against the S&P 500 (using the SPY ETF as the market series) over the trailing two years, and we show it with the as-of date of the last trading day in that window. Figures we have not recomputed carry their original market-data source and are shown with that source’s date instead.

stocks-llm shows beta where available, as delayed data with its as-of date, as one risk-context measure among several.

Volatility →

See more terms in the stocks-llm glossary.

Informational only — NOT financial advice. This is an educational definition, not a recommendation to buy or sell anything. Metrics on stocks-llm are delayed data and may be missing or stale. Always verify information independently and consult a qualified financial professional before making any investment decision.