What Sharpe, Sortino, Beta, and Alpha actually tell you

These four numbers, shown together under "Risk & Performance," are all trying to answer some version of the same question: given how much this investment moves around, was it actually worth holding? Beta is the simplest starting point - it measures how much a stock swings compared to the overall market over the past year. A beta of 1.0 means it roughly tracks the market; above 1 means bigger swings in both directions, below 1 means smaller, steadier moves.

Alpha builds on beta: it's the extra return (or shortfall) an investment delivered beyond what its beta would predict, over the past year. Positive alpha means it beat what its risk level alone would suggest; negative means it fell short. It's usually a small number - a few percentage points either way - so treat a large alpha as notable rather than expected.

Sharpe and Sortino both measure return-per-unit-of-risk, just with slightly different definitions of "risk." Sharpe uses all price volatility, up and down alike; Sortino only counts the downside, so it doesn't penalize an investment for volatility that happened to work in your favor. For both, above 1 is generally considered good, above 2 is very good, and a negative number means the investment didn't even beat a safe, boring alternative like a Treasury bond over that period.

All four of these are calculated from the trailing 12 months, recalculated fresh each time you load the page - they describe recent history, not a guarantee about what comes next. A stock with a great Sharpe ratio last year can have a rough one this year. They're most useful for comparing two options against each other right now, not as a permanent score.