21.   Among the Panthers directors who bought stock were two executives of Republic Industries Inc., a diversified services company whose holdings include the AutoNation USA car dealerships.

22.   Among other things, they have made it more difficult to borrow to buy Internet stocks and put certain limitations on initial public offerings.

23.   An option entitles the holder to buy a stock at a fixed price at a preset date in the future.

24.   An option gives the holder the right, though not the obligation, to buy the stock from the seller of the option at the strike price.

25.   Analysts said investors had been preparing for the earnings decline by buying stocks that promised stable growth.

26.   And a costly securities tax means that buying a stock in Tokyo is significantly more expensive than buying the same stock in London.

27.   An earlier transaction, in which Zapata bought stock in another company controlled by Malcolm Glazer, Envirodyne, is the subject of pending litigation.

28.   An option to buy a stock is a simple example of a derivative, the author points out.

29.   And demand just to buy those stocks is astonishing at times, despite the limited number of companies available to buy.

30.   Analysts expect the Ministry of Finance and Economy to ask executives of state-run funds to buy more stocks instead of bonds in a meeting this afternoon.