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Finance

PRIIPS

Packaged retail investment and insurance products (PRIIPs) is European Union regulatory term to encompass a range of investment products that banks or other financial institutions offer to consumers. It was first used in regulation (EU) No 1286/2014, known as the PRIIPs regulation, the aim of which was to improve the transparency and comparability of investment products across the EU th

Banking

Probability of default

Probability of default (PD) is a financial term describing the likelihood of a default over a particular time horizon. It provides an estimate of the likelihood that a borrower will be unable to meet its debt obligations.

Finance

Professional certification in financial services

Following is a partial list of professional certifications in financial services, with an overview of the educational and continuing requirements for each; see Professional certification § Accountancy, auditing and finance and Category:Professional certification in finance for all articles.

Finance

Quantitative easing

Quantitative easing (QE) is a monetary policy action where a central bank purchases predetermined amounts of government bonds, company shares, or other financial assets (liquidity) in order to artificially stimulate economic activity. Quantitative easing is a novel form of monetary policy that began in Japan and came into wide application in the US following the 2008 financial crisis. It

Finance

Quantitative tightening

Quantitative tightening (QT) is a contractionary monetary policy tool applied by central banks to decrease the amount of liquidity or money supply in the economy. A central bank implements quantitative tightening by reducing the financial assets it holds on its balance sheet by selling them into the financial markets, which decreases asset prices and raises interest rates. QT is the re

Securities & exchanges

Regulation A

In the United States under the Securities Act of 1933, any offer to sell securities must either be registered with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) or meet certain qualifications to exempt it from such registration. Regulation A (or Reg A) contains rules providing exemptions from the registration requirements, allowing some companies to offer and sell their secu

Securities & exchanges

Regulation S-K

Regulation S-K is a prescribed regulation under the US Securities Act of 1933 that lays out reporting requirements for various SEC filings used by public companies. Companies are also often called issuers (issuing or contemplating issuing shares), filers (entities that must file reports with the SEC) or registrants (entities that must register (usually shares) with the SEC).

Securities & exchanges

Regulation S-X

Regulation S-X is a prescribed regulation in the United States of America that lays out the specific form and content of financial reports, specifically the financial statements of public companies. It is cited as 17 C.F.R. Part 210; the name of the part is "Form and Content of and Requirements for Financial Statements, Securities Act of 1933, Securities Exchange Act of 1934, Public Util

Banking

Reserve requirement

Reserve requirements are central bank regulations that set the minimum amount that a commercial bank must hold in liquid assets. This minimum amount, commonly referred to as the commercial bank's reserve, is generally determined by the central bank on the basis of a specified proportion of deposit liabilities of the bank. This rate is commonly referred to as the cash reserve ratio or sh

Finance

Risk measure

In financial mathematics, a risk measure assigns a numerical value to the risk associated with a financial position or portfolio. In financial management and insurance, risk measures are often used to determine capital reserve requirements to mitigate downside risk to make it acceptable to regulators. In recent years attention has turned to convex and coherent risk measurement.

Securities & exchanges

Securities commission

A securities commission, securities regulator or capital market authority is a government department or agency responsible for financial regulation of securities products within a particular country. Its powers and responsibilities vary greatly from country to country, but generally cover the setting of rules as well as enforcing them for financial intermediaries and stock exchanges.

Finance

Set-off (law)

In law, set-off or netting is a legal technique applied between persons or businesses with mutual rights and liabilities, replacing gross positions with net positions. It permits the rights to be used to discharge the liabilities where cross claims exist between a plaintiff and a respondent, the result being that the gross claims of mutual debt produce a single net claim. The net claim i

Finance

Single Audit

In the United States, the Single Audit, Subpart F of the OMB Uniform Guidance, is a rigorous, organization-wide audit or examination of an entity that expends $750,000 or more of federal assistance (commonly known as federal funds, federal grants, or federal awards) received for its operations. Usually performed annually, the Single Audit's objective is to provide assurance to the US fed

Securities & exchanges

Standardized approach (counterparty credit risk)

The standardized approach for counterparty credit risk (SA-CCR) is the capital requirement framework under Basel III addressing counterparty risk for derivative trades.

Trading basics

Standardized approach (credit risk)

The term standardized approach (or standardised approach) refers to a set of credit risk measurement techniques proposed under Basel II, which sets capital adequacy rules for banking institutions.

Banking

Standardized approach (operational risk)

In the context of operational risk, the standardized approach or standardised approach is a set of operational risk measurement techniques proposed under Basel II capital adequacy rules for banking institutions.

Fiat currencies

Sterilization (economics)

In macroeconomics, sterilization is action taken by a country's central bank to counter the effects on the money supply caused by a balance of payments surplus or deficit.

Finance

Structured product

A structured product, also known as a market-linked investment, is a pre-packaged structured finance investment strategy based on a single security, a basket of securities, options, indices, commodities, debt issuance or foreign currencies, and to a lesser extent, derivatives.

Banking

Structuring

Structuring, also known as smurfing in banking jargon, is the practice of executing financial transactions such as making bank deposits in a specific pattern, calculated to avoid triggering financial institutions to file reports required by law, such as the United States' Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) and Internal Revenue Code section 6050I (relating to the requirement to file Form 8300). Struc

Fiat currencies

Taylor rule

The Taylor rule is a monetary policy targeting rule. The rule was proposed in 1992 by American economist John B. Taylor for central banks to use to stabilize economic activity by appropriately setting short-term interest rates. The rule considers the federal funds rate, the price level and changes in real income. The Taylor rule computes the optimal federal funds rate based on the gap be

Banking

Too big to fail

"Too big to fail" (TBTF) is a theory in banking and finance that asserts that certain corporations, particularly financial institutions, are so large and so interconnected with an economy that their failure would be disastrous to the greater economic system, and therefore should be supported by government when they face potential failure. The colloquial term "too big to fail" was popular

Finance

Treasury management

Treasury management (or treasury operations) entails management of an enterprise's financial holdings, focusing on the firm's liquidity, and mitigating its financial, operational and reputational risk.

Trading basics

TreasuryDirect

TreasuryDirect is a website run by the Bureau of the Fiscal Service under the United States Department of the Treasury that allows US individual investors to purchase treasury securities, such as savings bonds, directly from the US government. It enables people to manage their investments online, including connecting their TreasuryDirect account to a bank account for deposits and withdra

Trading basics

Trusted Shops

Trusted Shops is a company founded in Cologne, Germany, in 1999, which offers online shops and their customers trust-building services by means of a trustmark, a money-back guarantee process and a system of customer reviews. Online retailers are also provided with assistance in meeting legal requirements. Around 25,000 online shops display the trustmark as of July 2019.

Trading basics

Undertakings for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities Directive 2009

The Undertakings for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities Directive (Directive 2009/65/EC, "UCITS") is a directive of the European Union (EU) that allows collective investment schemes to operate freely throughout the EU on the basis of a single authorisation from one member state. EU member states are entitled to have additional regulatory requirements for the benefit of inve

Securities & exchanges

United States securities regulation

Securities regulation in the United States is the field of U.S. law that covers transactions and other dealings with securities. The term is usually understood to include both federal and state-level regulation by governmental regulatory agencies, but sometimes may also encompass listing requirements of exchanges like the New York Stock Exchange and rules of self-regulatory organizations

Trading basics

Value at risk

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.

Finance

Variable interest entity

A variable interest entity (VIE) is a legal structure defined by the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) for situations where control over a legal entity may be demonstrated through means other than voting rights. A public company with a financial interest in such entities may be subject to certain financial reporting requirements.

Trading basics

Venture capital

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

Securities & exchanges

XVA

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

Trading basics

Zero lower bound

The zero lower bound (ZLB) or zero nominal lower bound (ZNLB) is a macroeconomic problem that occurs when the short-term nominal interest rate is at or near zero, causing a liquidity trap and limiting the central bank's capacity for inflation targeting.