How does leverage work?

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  Borrowing to invest is also called getting leverage, or leveraging. You can leverage by:
• Going to a bank and taking out a loan. You may use the equity in your home to back up or secure the loan. If you do this, what will happen if your investment loses money? You may have to sell your home to pay back the loan.
• Borrowing money through a brokerage firm. This is called buying on margin. If you do this, what will happen if things don’t work out? You will have to put more of your own money into your account to cover your losses. Make sure you have a back-up plan for how you would handle this problem.
• Short selling. Here you borrow shares of a stock from your brokerage firm, and sell them at their current price. If the share price falls, you buy back the shares on the open market at the lower price. Then you give back the borrowed shares.
• What will you do if the shares go up, not down, in value? You will lose money. You will have to pay more to buy the shares back and return them to your brokerage firm.