ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Whisper number

So you know how sometimes people can guess how much candy they will get for Halloween? Well, grown-up people do something similar with the stock market. They try to guess how much money a company will make and how much their stock price will go up or down.

Sometimes, people share their guesses with others. But they might not want to tell everyone because they might be wrong and look silly. So they whisper their guesses to only a few people they trust.

These whispered guesses are called "whisper numbers". They are like secret predictions that only a few people know about. And sometimes, these whispered guesses can affect how people buy or sell stocks.