Definition:
Sell side analysts conduct securities research in support of financial advisors and other sales staff. In a sense, these analysts are trying to sell securities to the public, hence the phrase.
There is an inherent conflict of interest if the analyst's firm also offers investment banking services, which can be jeopardized by an analyst's negative rating on a given company or its securities. Thus, it has been noted for many decades that stock research analysts at Wall Street firms give positive ratings to many more securities than those that get negative opinions.
Compare with buy side analyst.
Alternate Spellings: Sell-Side Analyst
Examples: He took a job as a sell side analyst with a major brokerage firm.
