Elephants

Slang for large institutions that make trades in very high volumes.

Investopedia Says:
Examples of elephants are mutual funds, pension plans, banks, and insurance companies. One elephant trade can dramatically move the market price for a security. Think of a swimming pool: if an elephant stepped into the pool, the water level (stock price) would increase considerably, and if an elephant got out of the pool, the water level (stock price) would decrease significantly. In comparison to the elephants' influence on stock prices, the effect of an individual investor is more like that of a mouse.

Contrarian investors specialize in doing the opposite of the elephants, that is, buying when institutions are selling, and selling when institutions are buying.

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Expression describing large institutional investors. The term implies that such investors, including mutual funds, pension funds, banks, and insurance companies, tend to move their billions of dollars in assets in a herd-like manner, driving stock and bond prices up and down in concert. Contrarian investors specialize in doing the opposite of the elephants-buying when institutions are selling and selling when the elephants are buying. The opposite of elephants are Small Investors who buy and sell far smaller quantities of stocks and bonds.