LIQUIDITY

Liquidity generally refers to how easily a non-cash asset can be converted to cash. As an example: US Savings Bonds are generally very liquid. A large building, requiring months to sell, is generally considered not very liquid. Something you can't even give away (let alone sell) would be considered illiquid. In the stock market liquidity specifically refers to the ability to buy or sell a particular issue at a particular time. If you hold 10,000 shares of something that trades an average of 100 shares per day you would have a hard time selling all your holdings in short order without affecting the price.