Word.ws English Dictionary

front running

front running noun: the illegal practice of a stockbroker who, on receiving a large client order, places an order for his or her own account ahead of the client's, knowing that when the client's order is placed it will move the market and create a profit for the broker. Also the present participle and gerund of front run.

Noun

front running (uncountable)

  1. The illegal practice of a stockbroker who, on receiving a large client order, places an order for his or her own account ahead of the client's, knowing that when the client's order is placed it will move the market and create a profit for the broker.
    • The charges stem from an investigation into the front-running of block trades . . . a practice in which a trader takes a position to capitalize on advance knowledge of a transaction large enough to influence the price of securities.2012 October 1, Ben Moshinsky, “Four Charged for in U.K. FSA Insider-Trading Probe”, in Business Week, retrieved 19 May 2014
  2. The illegal practice of placing orders for a security on one's own account in advance of promoting or recommending it.
  3. Any practice of buying something the value of which is about to increase due to a future purchase by another, especially where the knowledge derives from a fiduciary relationship.

Also used as

front running is also the present participle and gerund of front run.

Synonyms of front running

Forms of front running

alternative formfront-running
alternative formfrontrunning

Questions about front running

What does front running mean?
Front running means the illegal practice of a stockbroker who, on receiving a large client order, places an order for his or her own account ahead of the client's, knowing that when the client's order is placed it will move the market and create a profit for the broker.
What part of speech is front running?
Front running is a noun.

Words near front running in the dictionary

  1. front rows
  2. Front Royal
  3. front run
  4. front runner
  5. front runners
  6. front running
  7. front runs
  8. front seat
  9. front seats
  10. front slash
  11. front slashes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: front running (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “front running.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/front_running. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.