speculation

IPA: spɛkjʌɫˈeɪʃʌn

(obsolete) The faculty of sight.
(obsolete) An act of looking at something; examination, observation.
The process or act of thinking or meditating on a subject.
(philosophy) The act or process of reasoning a priori from premises given or assumed.
A conclusion to which the mind comes by speculating; mere theory; notion; conjecture.
(business, finance) An investment involving higher-than-normal risk in order to obtain a higher-than-normal return.
The act or practice of buying land, goods, shares, etc., in expectation of selling at a higher price, or of selling with the expectation of repurchasing at a lower price; a trading on anticipated fluctuations in price, as distinguished from trading in which the profit expected is the difference between the retail and wholesale prices, or the difference of price in different markets.
A card game in which the players buy from one another trumps or whole hands, upon a chance of getting the highest trump dealt, which entitles the holder to the pool of stakes.
(programming) The process of anticipating which branch of code will be chosen and executing it in advance.

Examples of "speculation" in Sentences

Yes, long-term speculation is also called “investing”.
Home Entertainment declined to comment on what he called "speculation."
Mr. Sarkozy wants the EU to go further, especially in regulating what he called speculation.
Oh the contrary I think your speculation is a classic example of bending (and even inventing) the evidence to support a religious belief
DD: I don't like to use the term "speculation," as it's taken on a negative connotation that speculators are part of a conspiracy to drive up prices.
Somehow, such a simple appreciation of the reality that results from this little exercise in speculation is worth considering, even if there a number of facts to correct.
This speculation is a bit naive - there's no reason for it to change shape to fit our idea of an "intelligent life form," and it would have taken over 10 million years to do this.
If I may be allowed to appropriate the term speculation for the activity of forecasting the psychology of the market, and the term enterprise for the activity of forecasting the prospective yield of assets over their whole life, it is by no means always the case that speculation predominates over enterprise.