Michael Moore asking people walking in and out of the Stock Markets “What is a derivative” is as pointless as an atheist asking a minister “What is predestination?”. If you don’t have a foundation in the topic, the problem with explaining a concept is not that the person being asked doesn’t understand it – it’s that the person asking the question lacks the ability to understand their answer or is asking the question just to be argumentative – so it is pretty pointless to try to respond. Michael Moore just barely made it out of high school – he quickly dropped out of University of Michigan (Flint), which is little more than a community college.
Derivative: a contract whose value is based on the performance of an underlying financial asset, index, or other investment.
Source: Dictionary of Finance and Investment Terms, 5th Edition
John Downes & Jordon Elliot Goodman, published by Barron’s Educational Services (1998)
It has 716 pages of terms and examples if he really wanted to learn anything. I’m sure the 2009 edition probably has a few more pages.