The definition
A one-page summary of a company's earnings base rate before it reports: prints counted, share that moved more than ±5%, and the median absolute move.
The format, field by field
The card is defined by its contents. It counts the prints priced for the company; it states the share of those prints that moved more than ±5%; and it gives the median absolute move of the same set. A page carrying the name presents those contents in that form — the contents are the term's meaning, fixed by the definition above.
The three contents lean on three further terms: the print is the unit counted, the hit rate is the share stated, and the median absolute move is the size given. Each has its own entry.
Format discipline
Base-rate card is a branded format term. Cosmetic changes — layout, styling — leave the term untouched. A material change to the card's contents, a field added, dropped, or redefined, returns the term for a fresh pass before the new format ships under the name.
While the name is in use, a published card that drifts from the definition is a divergence defect: a fault in the card, not a redesign of the term.
How the card is read
The card is read as a count, in the order its fields are defined. The prints counted set the weight of the other two fields; the share beyond the threshold gives the frequency of large moves inside that set; the median gives the middle size. The reader guide works one card of record field by field.
What it is not
The card is not a verdict on the company, and it carries no direction for a future move: its share counts large moves on the way up and on the way down together, and no field of the card separates them.
It is a summary of a measured past, published ahead of the next print because the count behind it is already complete — completeness is what the timing records.