Recovery rate
The share of the investment holders get back after a default.
How to read the number
The second factor in credit risk: with equal probability of default, a secured and an unsecured issue produce different expected losses.
When the metric lies
Recovery does not arrive at once but through procedures stretched over years. Discounted to today, the sum is noticeably smaller than the amount nominally returned.
Also known as: recovery on default, loss given default complement