Industry WIKI

There are many types of e-commerce models, based on market segmentation, that can be used to conduct business online. The 6 types of business models that can be used in e-commerce include: Business-to-Consumer (B2C), Consumer-to-Business (C2B), Business-to-Business (B2B), Consumer-to-Consumer (C2C), Business-to-Administration (B2A), and Consumer-to-Administration

The Strategic Bitcoin Reserve is a proposed reserve asset, funded by the United States Department of the Treasury's forfeited bitcoin, announced by United States president Donald Trump in March 2025. The creation of the United States Digital Asset Stockpile for non-bitcoin assets was also announced. Trump has previously stated that he wants the United States to become the "crypto capita

Ugly Americans: The True Story of the Ivy League Cowboys Who Raided the Asian Markets for Millions is a book by Ben Mezrich that recounts the exploits of an American called John Malcolm (a pseudonym) arbitraging index futures in Japan in the 1990s. The book was released on May 4, 2004 by William Morrow and Company.

Under-capitalization refers to any situation where a business cannot acquire the funds they need. An under-capitalized business may be one that cannot afford current operational expenses due to a lack of capital, which can trigger bankruptcy, may be one that is over-exposed to risk, or may be one that is financially sound but does not have the funds required to expand to meet market dema

Underwriting (UW) services are provided by some large financial institutions, such as banks, insurance companies and investment houses, whereby they guarantee payment in case of damage or financial loss and accept the financial risk for liability arising from such guarantee. An underwriting arrangement may be created in a number of situations including insurance, issues of security in a

In business, a unicorn is a startup company valued at over US$1 billion which is privately owned and therefore its company shares are not publicly listed. The term was coined in 2013 by venture capitalist Aileen Lee, choosing the mythical animal to represent the statistical rarity of such successful ventures.

Unified Payments Interface (UPI) is an Indian instant payment system and protocol developed by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) in April 11th 2016. The interface facilitates inter-bank peer-to-peer (P2P) and person-to-merchant (P2M) transactions. It is used on mobile devices to instantly transfer funds between two bank accounts using only a unique UPI ID. It runs as an o

Unisys Corporation is an American technology company founded in 1986 and headquartered in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania. The company provides cloud, AI, digital workplace, logistics, and enterprise computing services.

The Emirati dirham (symbol: ; currency code: AED; ;) Arabic: درهم إماراتي, abbreviation: د.إ in Arabic, Dh; is the official currency of the United Arab Emirates. Each dirham is subdivided into 100 fulus (singular is "fils"). It is pegged to the United States dollar at a constant exchange rate of approximately 3.67 AED to 1 USD. In March 2025, the UAE Central Bank announced the creation o

United Stock Exchange of India Limited, also known as the United Stock Exchange (USE), is an Indian government owned stock exchange. It is the 4th pan-India exchange launched for trading financial instruments in India. USE represents the commitment of 21 Indian public sector banks, private banks, international banks and corporate houses to build an institution of repute. Mr. Gaurav Arora

A universal bank is a type of bank which participates in many kinds of banking activities and is both a commercial bank and an investment bank as well as providing other financial services such as insurance. These are also called full-service financial firms, although there can also be full-service investment banks which provide wealth and asset management, trading, underwriting, researc

In finance, unsecured debt refers to any type of debt or general obligation that is not protected by a guarantor, or collateralized by a lien on specific assets of the borrower in the case of a bankruptcy or liquidation or failure to meet the terms for repayment. Unsecured debts are sometimes called signature debt or personal loans. These differ from secured debt such as a mortgage, whic

In cryptocurrencies, an unspent transaction output (UTXO, often capitalized as UTxO) is a distinctive element in a subset of digital currency models. A UTXO represents a certain amount of cryptocurrency that has been authorized by a sender and is available to be spent by a recipient. The utilization of UTXOs in transaction processes is a key feature of many cryptocurrencies, but it prima

The uptick rule is a trading restriction that states that short selling a stock is allowed only on an uptick. For the rule to be satisfied, the short must be either at a price above the last traded price of the security, or at the last traded price when the most recent movement between traded prices was upward (i.e. the security has traded below the last-traded price more recently than a

In computing, Urbit is a decentralized personal server platform based on functional programming in a peer-to-peer network.

The international currency code for the US dollar is USD. This article covers its definition, mechanisms, verification methods, and common misconceptions.

USD1 is a US dollar stablecoin associated with the World Liberty Financial brand. This article introduces its positioning, mechanism, verification checklist, and common misconceptions.

USDC is a US dollar-backed stablecoin issued by Circle. This article introduces its positioning, mechanism, usage checklist, and common misconceptions.

USDe is the synthetic dollar asset of the Ethena protocol. This article covers its positioning, mechanism, usage checklist, and common misconceptions.

USDS is the stablecoin of the Sky protocol and is closely related to the evolution of DAI. This article covers its positioning, mechanism, usage checklist, and common misconceptions.

USDT is a US dollar-denominated stablecoin issued by Tether, designed to maintain a close value relationship with the US dollar. This article introduces its positioning, mechanism, verification checklist, and common misconceptions.

In finance, valuation is the process of determining the value of a (potential) investment, asset, or security.

Valuation risk is the risk that an entity suffers a loss when trading an asset or a liability due to a difference between the accounting value and the price effectively obtained in the trade.

Value at risk (VaR) is a measure of the risk of loss of investment/capital. It estimates how much a set of investments might lose (with a given probability), given normal market conditions, in a set time period such as a day. VaR is typically used by firms and regulators in the financial industry to gauge the amount of assets needed to cover possible losses.

Value investing is an investment paradigm that involves buying securities that appear underpriced by some form of fundamental analysis. Modern value investing derives from the investment philosophy taught by Benjamin Graham and David Dodd at Columbia Business School starting in 1928 and subsequently developed in their 1934 text Security Analysis.

Varo Bank is an American neobank headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah. Launched in 2017, Varo was the first neobank to receive a national bank charter from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.

The VEM (Acronym of Vale eletrônico Metropolitano, Electronic Metropolitan Ticket) is a Smart card system used in bus, train and metro of the metropolitan area of Recife, Brazil.

The 2009–2010 banking crisis in Venezuela occurred when the government took control of several banks following revelations that institutions owned by supporters of Hugo Chavez supporters were in financial trouble after engaging in questionable business practices. Some were seriously undercapitalized, others were apparently lending large sums of money to top executives, and at least one f

Venture capital (VC) is a form of private equity financing provided by firms or funds to startup, early-stage, and emerging companies, that have been deemed to have high growth potential or that have demonstrated high growth in terms of number of employees, annual revenue, scale of operations, etc. Venture capital firms or funds invest in these early-stage companies in exchange for equit

A venture capital trust or VCT is a tax efficient UK closed-end collective investment scheme designed to provide venture capital for small expanding companies, and income (in the form of dividend distributions) and/or capital gains for investors. VCTs are a form of publicly traded private equity, comparable to investment trusts in the UK or business development companies in the United St

Verifi, Inc. is an American financial technology company that provides dispute management and chargeback prevention tools for card-not-present payments. Founded in 2005 and headquartered in Los Angeles, California, Verifi offers products including Order Insight, Rapid Dispute Resolution (RDR), and the Cardholder Dispute Resolution Network (CDRN) to help merchants, issuers, and acquirers

Vix Technology (Vix) is an Australian company that designs, supplies and operates automated fare collection (AFC) systems, intelligent transportation systems (ITS), access, payment and passenger information display systems (PIDS) for the public transit industry.

Vocalink is a payment systems company headquartered in the United Kingdom, created in 2007 from the merger between Voca and LINK. It designs, builds and operates the UK payments infrastructure, which underpins the provision of the Bacs payment system and the UK ATM LINK switching platform covering 65,000 ATMs and the UK Faster Payments systems.

In finance, volatility arbitrage (vol arb) is a term for financial arbitrage techniques directly dependent and based on volatility.

Volatility risk

In finance, a volatility swap is a forward contract on the future realised volatility of a given underlying asset. Volatility swaps allow investors to trade the volatility of an asset directly, much as they would trade a price index. Its payoff at expiration is equal to

The Volfefe Index was a stock market index of volatility in market sentiment for US Treasury bonds caused by tweets by President Donald Trump.

In capital markets, volume, or trading volume, is the amount (total number) of a security (or a given set of securities, or an entire market) that was traded during a given period of time. In the context of a single stock trading on a stock exchange, the volume is commonly reported as the number of shares that changed hands during a given day. The transactions are measured on stocks, bon

Volume risk, also known as quantity risk, is the risk of production or sales volumes materially and adversely deviating from their expected quantities. The term has context-specific applications.

Voting interest (or voting power) in business and accounting means the total number, or percent, of votes entitled to be cast on the issue at the time the determination of voting power is made, excluding a vote which is contingent upon the happening of a condition or event which has not occurred at the time.

VugaPay is a cross-platform payment service owned by Vuga Ltd, a Rwandan company. It allows businesses and users to transfer money across major payment systems, including credit card networks, mobile money and Bitcoin via an application programming interface, unstructured supplementary service data interface, a mobile phone app, or a web interface. It processed over 5 million transaction

A vulture fund is a hedge fund or private-equity fund that invests in debt considered to be very weak or in default, known as distressed debt. Investors in the fund profit by buying debt at a discounted price on a secondary market and then using numerous methods to sell the debt for more than the purchasing price. Debtors include companies, countries, and individuals.

The Wall Street Journal Dollar Index (WSJ Dollar Index) is an index (or measure) of the value of the U.S. dollar relative to 16 foreign currencies.

In financial transactions, a warrant is a written order by one person that instructs or authorises another person to pay a specified recipient a specific amount of money or supply goods at a specific date. A warrant may or may not be negotiable and may be a bearer instrument that authorises payment to the warrant holder on demand or after a specific date. Governments and businesses may p

Watered stock is an asset with an artificially-inflated value. The term most commonly refers to a form of securities fraud in which a company issues stock to someone before receiving at least the par value in payment.

Wealth management (WM) or wealth management advisory (WMA) is an investment advisory service that provides financial management and wealth advisory services to a wide array of clients ranging from affluent to high-net-worth (HNW) and ultra-high-net-worth (UHNW) individuals and families.

Wealthfront Corporation is an American financial services company based in Palo Alto, California, founded by Andy Rachleff and Dan Carroll in 2008. As of September 2026, Wealthfront reported approximately $100 billion assets under management for more than 1.5 million clients.

Wealthsimple Inc. is a Canadian online investment management service. The firm was founded in September 2014 by Michael Katchen, Brett Huneycutt, and Rudy Adler and is based in Toronto. As of October 22, 2025, the firm holds over C$100 billion in assets under administration. It is primarily owned by Power Corporation, which holds a 52.4% undiluted stake aggregated through three entities:

WePay is an online payment service provider based in the United States. It provides an integrated and customizable payment solution, through its APIs, to platform businesses such as crowdfunding sites, marketplaces and small business software companies. It also offers partners fraud and risk protection.

The WIG20 is a capitalization-weighted stock market index of the twenty largest companies on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. Established on April 16, 1994. WIG is an acronym for "Warszawski Indeks Giełdowy", which translates to Warsaw Stock Index in Polish. However, so that no sector would dominate the index, the rule was introduced that there can be a maximum of 5 companies per sector. In th

Willow Wealth Inc. (formerly Yieldstreet) is an American financial technology company headquartered in New York City that operates an online platform for alternative investments. The platform enables accredited investors and retail investors to access private market asset classes including real estate, private credit, private equity, art, and legal finance. As of 2025, the platform repor

WinCapita, previously WinClub and GiiClub, was a Finnish Internet-based Ponzi scheme that advertised itself as a private investment club engaged in currency trading. In reality, it was a bucket shop like many other foreign exchange fraud schemes. It operated mainly in Finland, with a smaller number of members also in Sweden. The operation collected about 100 million euros from more than

Wire transfer, bank transfer, or credit transfer, is a method of electronic funds transfer from one person or entity to another. A wire transfer can be made from one bank account to another bank account, or through a transfer of cash at a cash office.

Wise, formerly known as TransferWise, is a British financial technology company focused on global money transfers and Business Finance. Headquartered in London, it was founded by Kristo Käärmann and Taavet Hinrikus in January 2011. As of 2023, it offers three main products: Wise Account, Wise Business, and Wise Platform.

The President's Working Group on Financial Markets, known colloquially as the Plunge Protection Team, or "(PPT)" was created by Executive Order 12631, signed on March 18, 1988, by United States President Ronald Reagan.

World, also known as World Network, is a humanity verification project and financial network. It was developed and launched as the cryptocurrency project Worldcoin. Among other organizations, contributors to the project include Tools for Humanity, a company founded in 2019 by Sam Altman, Max Novendstern, and Alex Blania. World's stated mission is to provide a reliable and anonymous way t

The World Business Angels Association (WBAA) was an international, not-for-profit organization whose mission was to stimulate the exchange of knowledge and best practices in the field of global angel capital financing for high-growth and innovative startups. It was closed around 2017.

The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an intergovernmental organization that regulates and facilitates international trade. Established on 1 January 1995, pursuant to the 1994 Marrakesh Agreement, it succeeded the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which was created in 1948. As the world's largest international economic organization, the WTO has 166 members, representing over

Worldpay Group plc (formerly RBS WorldPay) was a payment processing company. It was formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange until 16 January 2018 when it was acquired by Vantiv. The combined company then took the name Worldpay, Inc. Worldpay, Inc. was acquired by FIS in July 2019 for $43 billion. In 2024, private-equity firm GTCR acquired a majority 55% equity interest in Worldpay.

Xsolla is an American financial technology company that makes payment software for video games. It was founded in 2005 in Perm, Russia, by Aleksandr Agapitov. As of 2022, it had 500 employees. The company's core product is Pay Station, a suite of tools for integrating payment systems. It can be used to accept more than 1000+ payment types in more than 200 countries. Xsolla software was u

XTX Markets Limited is a British algorithmic trading company based in London. It was founded in January 2015 by Alexander Gerko, who is currently co-CEO alongside Hans Buehler. The company employs around 300 people globally (as of 2026) and uses state-of-the-art machine learning technology to produce price forecasts for over 50,000 financial instruments across equities, fixed income, cur

In mathematical finance, X-Value Adjustment (XVA, xVA) is an umbrella term referring to a number of different "valuation adjustments" that banks must make when assessing the value of derivative contracts that they have entered into. The purpose of these is twofold: primarily to hedge for possible losses due to other parties' failures to pay amounts due on the derivative contracts; but al

Yape (pronounced [ˈʝape]) is a digital wallet and mobile payment application developed by the Banco de Crédito del Perú (BCP) in 2016. As of 2025, it has over 20 million users. Its features include instant, commission-free peer-to-peer transfers, bill payments, and purchases using a smartphone via a phone number or QR code, without requiring a traditional bank account, enabling its use b

In finance, the yield on a security is a measure of the ex-ante return to a holder of the security. It is one component of return on an investment, the other component being the change in the market price of the security. It is a measure applied to fixed income securities, common stocks, preferred stocks, convertible stocks and bonds, annuities and real estate investments.

The yield to maturity (YTM), book yield or redemption yield of a fixed-interest security is an estimate of the total rate of return anticipated to be earned by an investor who buys it at a given market price, holds it to maturity, and receives all interest payments and the capital redemption on schedule.

YooKassa branded as ЮKassa (Previously Yandex.Checkout) (Russian: Яндекс.Касса), is a Russian E-commerce payment system operated by YooMoney, owned by Sberbank. It was launched in 2013.

York Capital Management (York Capital) is an American investment management company, founded by James Dinan and headquartered in New York City.

The Z-spread, ZSPRD, zero-volatility spread, or yield curve spread of a bond is the parallel shift or spread over the zero-coupon Treasury yield curve required for discounting a predetermined cash flow schedule to arrive at its present market price. The Z-spread is also widely used in the credit default swap (CDS) market as a measure of credit spread that is relatively insensitive to the

ZachXBT, also identified as Zachary Wolk is a pseudonymous American blockchain investigator and open-source intelligence (OSINT) researcher known for independent forensic investigations into cryptocurrency fraud, scams, and thefts. He has been active on X (formerly Twitter) since 2021, publishing detailed investigative threads that trace stolen funds, expose rug pulls, and identify perpe

Zelle () is an American digital payments network run by a private financial services company owned by Bank of America, Truist, Capital One, JPMorgan Chase, PNC Bank, U.S. Bank, and Wells Fargo. The Zelle service enables individuals to electronically transfer money from their bank account to another registered user's bank account (within the United States) using a mobile device or the web

In finance, a zero coupon swap (ZCS) is an interest rate derivative (IRD). In particular it is a linear IRD, that in its specification is very similar to the much more widely traded interest rate swap (IRS).

Zong was a mobile payment company that allowed users to make micropayments on the Internet if they have a postpaid mobile phone. The payments were charged to their mobile phone bills by the mobile operator. The company was acquired by eBay in 2011 and disappeared in 2015.

ZuluTrade is a Greek financial technology company that operates an online and mobile social and copy trading platform. The platform allows users to automatically copy the trades of other investors in the foreign exchange market. As of 2014 ZuluTrade had around one million users and an executed trading volume of over $800 billion.