# Why is it called a "long" or "short" position in the financial markets?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-long-or-short-position-in-the-financial-markets/404675>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [May 19, 2007, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-long-or-short-position-in-the-financial-markets/404675 "2007-05-19T01:36:54Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![relgar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8c91f0/32.png) [@relgar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/relgar)\
**Post date:** [May 19, 2007, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-long-or-short-position-in-the-financial-markets/404675/1 "2007-05-19T01:36:54Z")

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Is there a convincing explanation why it’s called going “long” if you buy a share on the stock market, and going “short” when you sell a share that you don’t own?

As far as I can tell, it’s a terminology choice made so long ago that everyone’s forgotten.

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**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\
**Post date:** [May 19, 2007, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-called-a-long-or-short-position-in-the-financial-markets/404675/2 "2007-05-19T02:09:42Z")

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“Short” comes from your having been short of the shares you sold and I suspect “long” came from needing a word to distinguish it from “short.”