Let's match each portfolio asset with its defintion
trading paper assets. It involves buying and selling of stocks, bonds, mutual funds, derivatives, and currencies. The paper asset is a representation of an underlying asset that can be of many types: stock, bonds, etc. Literally it is a piece of paper where the ownership of an asset is stated.
stocks: It represents ownership in a corporation. The capital of such company is divided in equally-valued shares which are sold in the financial markets and the buyers become its owners in the proportion of the value of the shares they have purchased.
mutual funds: It is a financial investment that pools money from investors to invest in securities. They have certain advantages if compared to investing individually on securities. They enable to reach economies of scale when conducting investments, they involve a higher level of diversification, more liquidity and they are controlled by professionals.
derivative: It is a contract whose value derives from other financial assets. More specifically, its value depends on an underlying, which can be an asset, an index, etc. Derivative contracts can be issued with a multiplicity of objectives: to protect other investment against price variations (insurance), to speculate, etc.
