The second speaker mentioned about “leverage”. What is that, could you elaborate?

Thanks!

Financial leverage is the money BORROWED (ie. Debt) buy more assets.

In corporate terms, leverage is used to avoid using too much equity to fund operations. An excessive amount of financial leverage increases the risk of failure, since it becomes more difficult to repay debt.

In stock investing terms, investors can use leverage to increase their exposure to the market by allowing them to pay less than the full amount of the investment. The downside is that if the stock tanks, then the investor loses his principal, and now also has to pay back the debt he took on. Buying stocks on a margin would constitute as an example of leverage.