What is Moving Average (MA)?

A moving average (MA) is a specialized method used to measure different data points by producing a series of averages of different data subsets related to the full data set. In a financial context, an MA is a stock indicator that is usually used for technical analysis (TA) to help predict the trends and direction of markets, asset prices, investment returns, and other data types. A moving average has many variations, including the Simple Moving Average (SMA), Cumulative Moving Average (CMA), and Weighted Moving Average (WMA), which are used to measure different types of data in a predetermined format.