Waivers and loans in NHL

Question

I have three related questions that concern NHL trading jargon.

Waiver

Wikipedia reports "Once an NHL player has played in a certain number of games or a set number of seasons has passed since the signing of his first NHL contract, that player must be offered to all of the other NHL teams before he can be assigned to a minor league affiliate." So, the question is: a player transferred through a waiver is not on loan, but has been sold to a different team before the end of the contract, is this statement correct?

Loan 1

If my understanding of waiver is right, I wonder whether there exist a separate trading institute that allow a player to temporarily change team, such as on loan (i.e. player P goes from team A to team B for a short period, even shorter than a full season, and then goes back to team A). Is there something like that in NHL?

Loan 2

Related to the question about loan, could a player be temporarily transferred to another team only for the playoffs?

Answer 1

Waivers means that if a team wants to send a player to the minors, they must offer that player first to the other NHL teams (the waiver wire). If claimed on waivers, that player is essentially traded to the other team for a nominal fee. That player is now a member of the claiming team.

Loans to non-NHL teams and sending players to the minors are essentially the same thing. Generally, NHL teams don't loan players to teams other than their affiliated minor league teams (some European players have a right to be loaned back to their European club).

Concerning the playoffs, the NHL has a rule that to be eligible for the playoffs, you must be on the team's roster by a certain date which is generally players under contract and certain draftees.

You can read the NHL CBA for more details.