Ticker symbol

Stock telegraph ticker machine invented by Thomas Edison

A ticker symbol or stock symbol is an abbreviation used to uniquely identify publicly traded shares of a particular stock on a particular stock market. In short, ticker symbols are arrangements of symbols or characters (generally Latin letters or digits) representing specific assets or securities listed on a stock exchange or traded publicly. A stock symbol may consist of letters, numbers, or a combination of both. "Ticker symbol" refers to the symbols that were printed on the ticker tape of a ticker tape machine.