Industry WIKI

Hi-pass (Korean: 하이패스) is an electronic toll collection system for the expressways in South Korea that allows motorists to make wireless toll payments, without the need to stop.

A high-occupancy toll lane (HOT lane) is a type of traffic lane or roadway that is available to high-occupancy vehicles and other exempt vehicles without charge; other vehicles are required to pay a variable fee that is adjusted in response to demand. Unlike toll roads, drivers have an option to use general purpose lanes, on which a fee is not charged. Express toll lanes, which are less

In 1978 and 1979, lawyer and First Lady of Arkansas Hillary Rodham Clinton engaged in a series of trades of cattle futures contracts. Her initial $1,000 investment had generated nearly $100,000 (equivalent to $443,603.85 in 2025), when she stopped trading after ten months. In 1994, after Clinton had become First Lady of the United States, the trading became the subject of considerable co

Hisense Group Co., Ltd. is a Chinese multinational major appliance and electronics manufacturer headquartered in Qingdao, Shandong, China. Television sets are one of its principal products. In the first quarter of 2026, Hisense accounted for 13% of global television shipments, behind Samsung and TCL, according to Counterpoint Research. Hisense also operates as an original equipment manuf

The Hispanic Television Summit is an annual conference for those in the business of television and video for Hispanic viewers in the United States, and worldwide. The Hispanic Television Summit is presented by two business publications for the television industry, Broadcasting & Cable and Multichannel News, and is produced by Joe Schramm and Rafael Eli (deceased, 2020) of Schramm Market

The use of historical money in Tibet started in ancient times, when Tibet had no coined currency of its own. Bartering was common, gold was a medium of exchange, and shell money and stone beads were used for very small purchases. A few coins from other countries were also occasionally in use.

The history of banking began with the first prototype banks, that is, the merchants of the world, who gave grain loans to farmers and traders who carried goods between cities. This was around 2000 BCE in Assyria, India, and Sumer. Later, in ancient Greece and during the Roman Empire, lenders based in temples gave loans, while accepting deposits and performing the change of money. Archaeo

The history of banking in China includes the business of dealing with money and credit transactions in China.

The term "bank" is attributed to the tables used by "trapezitai", ancient Greek bankers, which provided currency exchange, money storage and loan services, facilitating trade. (See main article: History of Banking)

Banking in the United Kingdom began in the Kingdom of England in the 17th century. The first activity in what later came to be known as banking was by goldsmiths who, after the dissolution of English monasteries by Henry VIII, began to accumulate significant stocks of gold.

Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency, a digital asset that uses cryptography to control its creation and management rather than relying on central authorities. Originally designed as a medium of exchange, Bitcoin is now primarily regarded as a store of value. The history of bitcoin started with its invention and implementation by Satoshi Nakamoto, who integrated many existing ideas from the crypt

The history of Canadian currencies began with Indigenous peoples in Canada prior to European contact, when they used items such as wampum and furs for trading purposes. The Indigenous peoples continued to use those items as currency when trade with Europeans began. During the period of French colonization, coins were introduced, as well as one of the first examples of paper currency by a

Credit unions are not-for-profit financial cooperatives. In the early stages of development of a nation's financial system, unserved and underserved populations had to rely on risky and expensive informal financial services from sources like money lenders, ROSCAs and saving at home. Credit unions proved they could meet demand for financial services that banks could not: from professio

Debt relief, or debt forgiveness, has been practiced in many societies since antiquity. Periodic debt remission was institutionalised in the Ancient Near East and contributed to the stability of its societies. In ancient Greece and Rome the laws were more creditor-friendly and debt cancellation was one of the major demands of the poor, only occasionally implemented by the government. Med

The history of insurance traces the development of the modern business of insurance against risks, especially regarding cargo, property, death, automobile accidents, and medical treatment.

Philadelphia financier Jay Cooke established the first modern American investment bank during the Civil War era. However, private banks had been providing investment banking functions since the beginning of the 19th century and many of these evolved into investment banks in the post-bellum era. However, the evolution of firms into investment banks did not follow a single trajectory. Fo

The history of monetary policy in China involves the evolution of the Chinese government's monetary policies from different imperial dynasties to the modern reforms created and employed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). China's monetary system changed significantly during the imperial period, moving from bronze coins to paper currency long before Europe did. In ancient times, variou

The history of money is the development over time of systems for the exchange of goods and services. Money is a means of fulfilling these functions indirectly and in general rather than directly, as with barter.

Many European trading companies came to India's during the 18th century. These trading companies set up private banks which issued paper currencies in Indian subcontinent first. But these notes were text-based. Charles Canning, 1st Earl Canning first introduced paper currency in Indian subcontinent in 1861 officially.

Pawnbroking, lending money on portable security, began in ancient history. The practice was widespread in many parts of the world, from ancient Greece to medieval China and medieval Europe.

The history of private equity, venture capital, and the development of these asset classes has occurred through a series of boom-and-bust cycles since the middle of the 20th century. Within the broader private equity industry, two distinct sub-industries, leveraged buyouts and venture capital experienced growth along parallel, although interrelated tracks.

The history of Thai money used as a medium of exchange and to settle accounts before the adoption of Thai baht coins and banknotes include novel designs and forms. For Thai people, money was considered as the symbol of civilization. Currency itself reflected faith in religion, culture, the customs and traditions of each era and also serve as a record of the development of Thailand.

The United States Federal Reserve System is the central banking system of the United States. It was created on December 23, 1913.

The currency of Indonesia, the rupiah, has a long history dating back to its colonial period. Due to periods of economic uncertainty and high inflation, the currency has been re-valued several times.

This article outlines the history of Wells Fargo & Company from its merger with Norwest Corporation and beyond. The new company chose to retain the name of "Wells Fargo" and so this article is about the history after the merger.

HKeToll (Chinese: 易通行) is a free-flow tolling system owned by the Transport Department in Hong Kong. It is operated by Autotoll Limited. The system has been gradually put into use in various government-owned tunnels in Hong Kong to replace traditional toll booths and Autotoll from May 2023 onward.

His Majesty's Revenue and Customs (commonly known as HMRC) is a department of the UK government responsible for the collection of taxes, the payment of some forms of state support, the administration of other regulatory regimes including the national minimum wage, and the issuance of national insurance numbers.

The Hollow Sword Blades Company was a British joint-stock company founded in 1691 by a goldsmith, Sir Stephen Evance, for the manufacture of hollow-ground rapiers.

The Hollywood Stock Exchange, or HSX, is a web-based, multiplayer game in which players use simulated money to buy and sell "shares" of actors, directors, upcoming films, and film-related options. The game uses Virtual Specialist technology invented by HSX co-founders and creators Max Keiser and Michael R. Burns, who were awarded a U.S. patent no. 5950176 in 1999 for the invention. Clai

Holmes' Bank was a bank in the British Crown dependency of the Isle of Man, providing private and business banking services to the local population. Holmes' Bank crashed spectacularly in 1853 resulting in hardship, unemployment, bankruptcy and destitution for many of the inhabitants of the Island.

Home equity is the homeowner's financial interest in their property, calculated as the difference between the property's current market value and the total outstanding balances of all loans secured by the home.

Home equity investments (HEI) are financial products that allow homeowners to access their home equity as a lump sum without incurring monthly payments. They first emerged around 2015 and function by enabling investors to purchase a minority stake in a homeowner's property for a predetermined duration. In return, investors receive either a percentage of the home's future market value or

A home equity line of credit (HELOC; /ˈhe̞ːˌlɒk/ HEE-lok) is a revolving type of secured loan in which the lender agrees to lend a maximum amount within an agreed period (called a term), where the collateral is the borrower's property (akin to a second mortgage). Because a home often is a consumer's most valuable asset, many homeowners use their HELOC for major purchases or projects, suc

A home equity loan is a type of loan in which the borrowers use the equity of their home as collateral. The loan amount is determined by the value of the property, and the value of the property is determined by an appraiser from the lending institution.

Home price protection is an agreement that pays the homeowner if a particular home price index declines in value over a period of time after the protection is purchased. The protection is for a new or existing homeowner that wishes to protect the value of their home from future market declines.

A home warranty is a contract that agrees to provide a homeowner with discounted repair and replacement services. However, the words "home warranty" are not always used explicitly to mean a legal warranty is being conveyed. In many cases, at least in the United States, a home warranty is not a warranty at all, but rather a home service contract that covers the repair and/or replacement

Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (HKEX; Chinese: 香港交易及結算所有限公司; pinyin: Xiānggǎng jiāoyì jí jiésuàn suǒyǒu xiàn gōngsī) operates a range of equity, commodity, fixed income and currency markets through its wholly owned subsidiaries The Stock Exchange of Hong Kong Limited (SEHK), Hong Kong Futures Exchange Limited (HKFE) and London Metal Exchange (LME).

Hong Kong Mercantile Exchange (Chinese: 香港商品交易所; abbreviated as HKMEx) was an electronic commodities exchange established in Hong Kong for the trading of commodity futures, options and other financial derivatives. The exchange was originally pitched as a platform to trade oil futures. In fact, it ended up trading mainly silver and gold futures.

The Stock Exchange of Hong Kong (Chinese: 香港交易所, SEHK, also known as Hong Kong Stock Exchange) is a stock exchange based in Hong Kong. It is one of the largest stock exchanges in Asia and the 6th largest globally by market capitalization as of February 2026. The exchange plays a crucial role in connecting international investors with mainland Chinese companies, serving as a major platfor

The Honored Economist (also translated as The Merited Economist of Ukraine, Ukrainian: Заслужений економіст України) is an honorary title of Ukraine, awarded for personal merits to the Ukrainian state to citizens who worked in a relevant branch of the economy or socio-cultural sphere, as a rule, for at least ten years, have high work achievements and professional skill.

Hope & Co. was a Dutch bank that existed for two and a half centuries. The bank was located in Amsterdam until 1795; originally it concentrated on Great Britain. In the second half of the 18th century, it was the most powerful merchant bank of Amsterdam, and thus Europe, as Amsterdam was at that time Europe's leading financial centre. From 1750 it played a major part in the finances of t

HotelOnline is a travel technology company, offering a suite of digital tools for e-commerce, online marketing and operations automation to the hotel industry in Sub-Saharan Africa. The company helps hotels digitize operations and offers managed distribution to online channels, such as Online Travel Agents (OTAs), Global Distribution Systems, and metasearch engines.

Hottinger first appears in the annals of the town of Zöllikon, near Zurich, in 1362. The town had recently joined the Swiss Confederation, and was poised to become a thriving center for trade. In 1401, three members of the Hottinger family were named Grand Burghers of the city. Their names Hans, Heinrich and Rudolf – or, in their French variants, Jean, Henri and Rodolphe – have marked th

The House Committee on Finance is a standing committee of the House of Representatives in Nigeria. The committee is responsible for overseeing financial matters in the country, including revenue generation, budget planning, and fiscal policies.

Household debt is the combined debt of all people in a household, including consumer debt and mortgage loans. A significant rise in the level of this debt coincides historically with many severe economic crises and was a cause of the U.S. and subsequent euro area crisis. Several economists have argued that lowering this debt is essential to economic recovery in the U.S. and selected Euro

Housing stress describes a situation where the cost of housing (either as rental, or as a mortgage) is high relative to household income. It may also be used to describe inadequate housing for a proportion of the population.

HSBC Bank Bermuda Limited, previously the Bank of Bermuda Limited, is a financial services company in Bermuda providing retail and corporate banking, investment, custody and fund administration services to international and local clients. In 2004 the HSBC Group acquired the Bank of Bermuda, which has since become a focus for certain fund management and private banking activities. The ban

HTX, formerly known as Huobi, is a Seychelles-based cryptocurrency exchange. Founded in China, (Chinese: 火币网; pinyin: Huǒbìwǎng), HTX now has offices in Hong Kong, South Korea, Japan and the United States. In August 2018, it became a publicly listed Hong Kong company. According to Bloomberg, it is owned by cryptocurrency billionaire Justin Sun.

Hub Culture is a membership network and digital identity company founded in November 2002 by Stan Stalnaker. The company is based in Bermuda. It is known for Ven, an asset-backed digital currency launched in 2007, and for temporary physical spaces called Pavilions, which it has operated at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, at UN climate conferences and at other internatio

In financial mathematics, the Hull–White model is a model of future interest rates. In its most generic formulation, it belongs to the class of no-arbitrage models that are able to fit today's term structure of interest rates. It is relatively straightforward to translate the mathematical description of the evolution of future interest rates onto a tree or lattice and so interest rate de

Hyosung Group is a major South Korean conglomerate established in 1966. The company operates across diverse sectors including textiles, heavy industries, chemicals, and information & communication.

The term hype culture refers to a cultural trend within contemporary consumer culture, that corresponds to the constant search of the last "big thing". This phenomenon circulates around the concept of expectation, more precisely it is characterized by an attitude of excessive and positive expectations that consumers attach to products, services or technological advancements which have ye

Hyperbridge is a cross-chain interoperability bridge that uses cryptographic protocols to facilitate the transfer of assets and data between different blockchains. Hyperbridge was launched on Polkadot mainnet in 2024 by Polytope Labs. The protocol is designed with a decentralised verification system which eliminates traditional reliance on blockchain validators, addressing the limitation

In economics, hyperinflation is a very high and typically accelerating inflation. It quickly erodes the real value of the local currency, as the prices of all goods increase. This causes people to minimize their holdings in that currency as they usually switch to more stable foreign currencies. Effective capital controls and currency substitution ("dollarization") are the orthodox soluti

In the early Soviet Union, there was a seven-year period of hyperinflation, running from the earliest days of the Bolshevik Revolution in November 1917 to the reestablishment of the gold standard with the introduction of the chervonets as part of the New Economic Policy. The inflationary crisis effectively ended in March 1924 with the introduction of the so-called "gold ruble" as the cou

Hyperledger (or the Hyperledger Project) is an umbrella project of open source blockchains and related tools that the Linux Foundation started in December 2015. IBM, Intel, and SAP Ariba have contributed to support the collaborative development of blockchain-based distributed ledgers. It was renamed the Hyperledger Foundation in October 2021. In September 2024, Hyperledger Foundation and

HyperVerse is a defunct cryptocurrency hedge fund (formerly HyperNation, then HyperFund, then HyperVerse in 2021). The collapse of the company resulted in approximately $1.3 billion in customer losses.

Hypothec (; from Lat. hypotheca, from Gk. ὑποθήκη: hypothēkē), sometimes tacit hypothec, is a term used in civil law systems (e.g. the law of most of Continental Europe) to refer to a registered real security of a creditor over real estate, but under some jurisdictions it may additionally cover ships only (ship hypothec), as opposed to other collaterals, including corporeal movables othe

== Overview and History ==

International Business Machines Corporation, doing business as IBM (nicknamed Big Blue), is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, and present in over 175 countries. It is a publicly traded company and one of the 30 companies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average. IBM is the largest industrial research organization in the world, with 19 research fac

This article describes IBM point of sale equipment from 1973 with the introduction of the IBM 3650 till 1986 with the introduction of the IBM 4680. IBM continued to announced new retail products until the sale of the IBM Retail Store Solutions business to Toshiba TEC, announced on 17 April 17 2012.

ICE Clear Credit LLC, a Delaware limited liability company, is a Derivatives Clearing Organisation (DCO) previously known as ICE Trust US LLC which was launched in March 2009.

ICLUB is a global community of angel investment clubs founded by Viktoriya Tihipko's TA Ventures in 2018. ICLUB's clubs invest in startups sourced, approved and invested by the European venture fund TA Ventures. ICLUB acts as an intermediary between startups and private investors.

iDEAL is an e-commerce payment system used for online banking in the Netherlands. Previously controlled by the Dutch e-commerce organization Currence since 2006, the company became owned by the European Payments Initiative (EPI) from October 2023.

An identity score is a system for detecting identity theft. Identity scores are increasingly being adopted as a means to prevent fraud in business and as a tool to verify and correct public records.

IFRS 16 is an International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) promulgated by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) providing guidance on accounting for leases. IFRS 16 was issued in January 2016 and is effective for most companies that report under IFRS since 1 January 2019. Upon becoming effective, it replaced the earlier leasing standard, IAS 17.

IFRS 17 is the International Financial Reporting Standard detailing how reporting entities issuing insurance contracts account for the resulting rights and obligations. The standard describes a general approach but permits in some cases a simplified approach. The general approach requires to measure the rights and obligations based on the risk adjusted expected present value of future c

IFRS 4 is an International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) issued by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) providing guidance for the accounting of insurance contracts. The standard was issued in March 2004, and was amended in 2005 to clarify that the standard covers most financial guarantee contracts. Paragraph 35 of IFRS also applies the standard to financial instru

IFRS 9 is an International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) published by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB). It addresses the accounting for financial instruments. It contains three main topics: classification and measurement of financial instruments, impairment of financial assets and hedge accounting. The standard came into force on 1 January 2018, replacing the

IG Group Holdings plc, trading as IG Group, is a United Kingdom-based online trading and investment provider, offering access to spread betting, US futures and options, stock and crypto trading, which allows traders to bet on the direction of equities, bonds and currencies without owning the underlying assets.

Ijarah, (Arabic: الإجارة, al-Ijārah, "to give something on rent" or "providing services and goods temporarily for a wage" (a noun, not a verb)), is a term of fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence) and product in Islamic banking and finance.

Ikoyi is the most affluent island of Lagos, located in Eti-Osa Local Government Area. It lies to the northeast of Obalende and adjoins Lagos Island to the west, and at the edge of the Lagos Lagoon. Popular with the extreme upper class residents of Nigerian society, Ikoyi is arguably one of the wealthiest communities within Nigeria.

Illicit financial flows, in economics, are a form of illegal capital flight that occurs when money is illegally earned, transferred, or spent. This money is intended to disappear from any record in the country of origin, and earnings on the stock of illicit financial flows outside a country generally do not return to the country of origin.

Immediate Payment Service (IMPS) is an instant payment inter-bank electronic funds transfer system in India. National Electronic Funds Transfer (NEFT) was also made available 24/7 from December 2019. Real-time gross settlement (RTGS) was also made available 24/7 from 14 December 2020.

Immigrant investor programs are immigration programs offered by countries or territories that allow individuals to more quickly obtain residence or citizenship of a country in return for making qualifying and substantive investments. Broadly, the programs offer either citizenship by investment ("golden passport" or "cash-for-passports"), residence by investment ("golden visa"), or a hybr

Immutable Pty Ltd (formerly Fuel Games) is an Australian cryptocurrency company which develops blockchain games and non-fungible tokens (NFTs). The company was founded in 2018 and headquartered in Sydney, Australia.

Impact investing refers to investments "made into companies, organizations, and funds with the intention to generate a measurable, beneficial social or environmental impact alongside a financial return". At its core, impact investing is about an alignment of an investor's beliefs and values with the allocation of capital to address social and/or environmental issues.

The impact of microcredit is the study of microcredit and its impact on poverty reduction which is a subject of much controversy. Proponents state that it reduces poverty through higher employment and higher incomes. This is expected to lead to improved nutrition and improved education of the borrowers' children. Some argue that microcredit empowers women. In the US and Canada, it is arg

In economics, implicit contracts refer to voluntary and self-enforcing long term agreements made between two parties regarding the future exchange of goods or services. Implicit contracts theory was first developed to explain why there are quantity adjustments (layoffs) instead of price adjustments (falling wages) in the labor market during recessions.

In international economics and international political economy, the impossible trinity (also known as the trilemma, the monetary trilemma or the Unholy Trinity) is the view that it is impossible to have all three of the following at the same time:

The imprest system is a form of financial accounting. The most common is petty cash. The basic characteristic of an imprest system is that a fixed amount is reserved, which after a certain period or when circumstances require, because money was spent, will be replenished. This replenishment will come from another account, e.g. petty cash may be replenished by cashing a cheque drawn on a

Imputed rent is the estimated rental price that an individual would pay for an asset they own. This concept applies broadly to capital goods but is most frequently used in housing markets to measure the rent homeowners would pay for a housing unit equivalent to their own. Imputing housing rent is essential for accurately measuring economic activity in national accounts, as asset owners d

IMX (Interactive Music Exchange) is an American music television program that aired daily from 2002 to 2004 on MMUSA (renamed Fuse TV in May 2003). Described as a "fully converged music industry simulation game" and "part TV show, part Internet game," the program asked viewers to register at the network's website and buy ownership interests in popular artists, songs, and albums. In deali

In canon law, commenda (or in commendam) was a form of transferring an ecclesiastical benefice in trust to the custody of a patron. The phrase in commendam was originally applied to the provisional occupation of an ecclesiastical benefice, which was temporarily without an actual occupant, in contrast to the conferral of a title, in titulum, which was applied to the regular and unconditi

The term in kind (or in-kind) generally refers to goods, services, and transactions not involving money or not measured in monetary terms. It is a part of many spheres, mainly economics, finance, but also politics, work career, food, health and others. There are many different types of in kind actions throughout the mentioned branches, which can be identified and distinguished.

An incentive is anything that persuades a person or organization to alter their behavior to produce a desired outcome. Incentives are widely studied in personnel economics, where researchers and human resource managers examine how firms use pay, career opportunities, performance evaluation, and other mechanisms to motivate employees and improve organizational outcomes. Higher incentives

Income is the consumption and saving opportunity gained by an entity within a specified timeframe, which is generally expressed in monetary terms. Income is difficult to define conceptually and the definition may be different across fields. For example, a person's income in an economic sense may be different from their income as defined by law.

Income Protection Insurance (IPI) also known as loss of earnings insurance is an insurance policy paying benefits to policyholders who are incapacitated and hence unable to work due to illness or accident. This is typically a replacement for lost income suffered by the policy holder. These policies were formerly called Permanent Health Insurance (PHI). This type of insurance does not nor

The Income Tax Department is a government agency undertaking direct tax collection of the government of the Republic of India. It functions under the Department of Revenue of the Ministry of Finance. The Income Tax Department is headed by the apex body Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT). The main responsibility of the Income Tax Department is to enforce various direct tax laws, most im

Incomes policies in economics are economy-wide wage and price controls, most commonly instituted as a response to inflation, and usually seeking to establish wages and prices below free-market level. Incomes policies have often been resorted to during wartime. During the French Revolution, "The Law of the Maximum" imposed price controls (by penalty of death) in an unsuccessful attempt to

In economics, incomplete markets are markets in which there does not exist an Arrow–Debreu security for every possible state of nature. In contrast with complete markets, this shortage of securities will likely restrict individuals from transferring the desired level of wealth among states.

An independent advisory firm (sometimes less accurately called an advisory boutique) is an investment bank that provides strategic and financial advice to clients, primarily including corporations, financial sponsors, and governments. Revenues are typically generated by providing deal-specific advice related to mergers and acquisitions as well as financing. The WSJ noted in January 2016

Independent Reserve is an Australian-based digital currency exchange founded in 2013. They are an order book exchange and an OTC desk.

This aims to be a complete list of the articles on real estate.

The Indian Revenue Service (Customs and Indirect Taxes) is a part of central civil service of the government of India. It is a part of the Indian Revenue Service and functions under the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs, Department of Revenue of the Ministry of Finance. It is under the administrative direction of the Revenue Secretary and the ministerial command of the Minister

Individual capital, the economic view of talent, comprises inalienable or personal traits of persons, tied to their bodies and available only through their own free will, such as skill, creativity, enterprise, courage, capacity for moral example, non-communicable wisdom, invention or empathy, non-transferable personal trust and leadership.

An individual savings account (ISA or Isa; ) is a class of retail investment arrangement available to residents of the United Kingdom. Introduced in 1999 as an Individual Special Savings Account (ISSA), the accounts are exempt from income tax and capital gains tax on the investment returns, and no tax is payable on money withdrawn from the scheme.

The World Bank Group's involvement in Indonesia has developed over the past sixty years to become one of the Group's most significant operations, including lending, knowledge services, and implementation support. Since 2004, World Bank assistance has evolved into a more collaborative system of support for a policy agenda with significant domestic control and guidance, better conforming w

The Indonesian Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre or INTRAC (Indonesian: Pusat Pelaporan dan Analisis Transaksi Keuangan, PPATK) is a government agency of Indonesia responsible for financial intelligence. The agency was formed in 2002 to prevent and eradicate suspected illicit financial flows as money laundering and provide information on transnational organized crime and

In the teaching of the Catholic Church, an indulgence (Latin: indulgentia, from indulgeo, 'permit') is "a way to reduce the amount of punishment one has to undergo for (forgiven) sins". The Catechism of the Catholic Church describes an indulgence as "a remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven, which the faithful Christian who is du