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Digital assets and currencies

Understand assets, networks and trading mechanics with sources you can check.

Trading basics

Pension systems by country

The table below shows the pension systems pillars by country.

Assets

Perpetual futures

In finance, perpetual futures, also known as perpetual swaps or colloquially as perps, are contract agreements to non-optionally buy or sell an asset at an unspecified point in the future. Perpetual futures are cash-settled, and they differ from regular futures in that they lack a pre-specified delivery date and can thus be held indefinitely without the need to roll over contracts as the

Finance

Personal finance

Personal finance is the financial management that an individual or a family unit performs to budget, save, and spend monetary resources in a controlled manner, taking into account various financial risks and future life events.

Trading basics

Personal income

In economics, personal income refers to the total earnings of an individual from various sources such as wages, investment ventures, and other sources of income. It encompasses all the products and money received by an individual.

Trading basics

Perth Mint

The Perth Mint is Australia's official bullion mint and wholly owned by the Government of Western Australia. Established on 20 June 1899, two years before Australia's Federation in 1901, the Perth Mint was the last of three Australian colonial branches of the United Kingdom's Royal Mint (after the now-defunct Sydney Mint and Melbourne Mint) intended to refine gold from the gold rushes an

Securities & exchanges

Pin risk

Pin risk occurs when the market price of the underlier of an option contract at the time of the contract's expiration is close to the option's strike price. In this situation, the underlier is said to have pinned. The risk to the writer (seller) of the option is that they cannot predict with certainty whether the option will be exercised or not. So the writer cannot hedge their position

Finance

Pivot point (technical analysis)

In financial markets, a pivot point is a price level that is used by traders as a possible indicator of market movement. A pivot point is calculated as an average of significant prices (high, low, close) from the performance of a market in the prior trading period. If the market in the following period trades above the pivot point it is usually evaluated as a bullish sentiment, whereas

Finance

Planet Money

Planet Money is an American podcast and blog produced by NPR that explains economic topics in a way that is aimed at a broad audience. Alex Blumberg and Adam Davidson created the podcast in the early days of the 2008 financial crisis. Episodes are generally 30 minutes or less stand-alone explorations of a specific concept, though the podcast has also released several series following spe

Finance

Point and figure chart

Point and figure (P&F) is a charting technique used in technical analysis. Point and figure charting does not plot price against time as time-based charts do. Instead it plots price against changes in direction by plotting a column of Xs as the price rises and a column of Os as the price falls.

Trading basics

Poju Zabludowicz

Chaim "Poju" Zabludowicz (born 6 April 1953) is a Finnish-British-Israeli billionaire businessman, art collector and philanthropist.

Finance

Portfolio optimization

Portfolio optimization is the process of selecting an optimal portfolio (asset distribution), out of a set of considered portfolios, according to some objective. The objective typically maximizes factors such as expected return, and minimizes costs like financial risk, resulting in a multi-objective optimization problem. Factors being considered may range from tangible (such as assets, l

Finance

Position (finance)

In finance, a position is the amount of a particular security, commodity or currency held or owned by a person or entity.

Trading basics

Post-modern portfolio theory

Simply stated, post-modern portfolio theory (PMPT) is an extension of the traditional modern portfolio theory (MPT) of Markowitz and Sharpe. Both theories provide analytical methods for rational investors to use diversification to optimize their investment portfolios. The essential difference between PMPT and MPT is that PMPT emphasizes the return that must be earned on an investment in

Payments & settlement

Postal order

A postal order or postal note is a type of money order usually intended for sending money through the mail. It is purchased at a post office and is payable to the named recipient at another post office. A fee for the service, known as poundage, is paid by the purchaser. In the United States, this is known as a postal money order. Postal orders are not legal tender, but a type of promiss

Securities & exchanges

Power reverse dual-currency note

A dual-currency note (DC) pays coupons in the investor's domestic currency with the notional in the issuer's domestic currency. A reverse dual-currency note (RDC) is a note which pays a foreign interest rate in the investor's domestic currency. A power reverse dual-currency note (PRDC) is a structured product where an investor is seeking a better return and a borrower a lower rate by tak

Trading basics

Precious metal

Precious metals are rare, naturally occurring metallic minerals of high economic value. Precious metals, particularly the noble metals, are more corrosion resistant and less chemically reactive than most elements. They are usually ductile and have a high lustre. Historically, precious metals were important as currency but they are now regarded mainly as investment and industrial raw mate

Trading basics

Prime brokerage

Prime brokerage is the generic term for a bundled package of services offered by large financial institutions (including investment banks and broker-dealers) to hedge funds, commonly including financing and securities lending to facilitate leveraged trading strategies. Prime brokers also typically provide centralized clearing and settlement and consolidated reporting for client positions

Trading basics

Private equity

Private equity (PE) is stock in a private company that does not offer stock to the general public. Instead, it is offered to specialized investment funds and limited partnerships that take an active role in managing and structuring the companies. Colloquially, "private equity" can refer to these investment firms rather than the companies in which they invest.

Trading basics

Private equity real estate

Private equity real estate is a term used in investment finance to refer to a specific subset of the real estate investment asset class. Private equity real estate refers to one of the four quadrants of the real estate capital markets, which include private equity, private debt, public equity and public debt.

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.

Trading basics

Profit motive

In economics, the profit motive is the motivation of firms that operate so as to maximize their profits. Mainstream microeconomic theory posits that the ultimate goal of a business is "to make money" - not in the sense of increasing the firm's stock of means of payment (which is usually kept to a necessary minimum because means of payment incur costs, i.e. interest or foregone yields), b

Banking

Project Merlin

Project Merlin is an agreement between the British Government of David Cameron and four of the major high street banks in the United Kingdom. These banks are Barclays, Lloyds Banking Group, the Royal Bank of Scotland and HSBC. The agreement covers aspects of banking activity, notably lending, pay and bonuses with the intention of promoting lending to businesses, particularly small busine

Trading basics

Proof coinage

Proof coinage refers to special early samples of a coin issue, historically made for checking the dies (as in demonstrating that something is true) and for archival purposes. In modern times, proofs are often struck in greater numbers, especially for coin collectors (numismatists). Nearly all countries have issued proof coinage.

Securities & exchanges

Property derivative

A property derivative is a financial derivative whose value is derived from the value of an underlying real estate asset. In practice, because individual real estate assets fall victim to market inefficiencies and are hard to accurately price, property derivative contracts are typically written based on a real estate property index. In turn, the real estate property index attempts to a

Finance

Public finance

Public finance refers to the monetary resources available to governments and also to the study of finance within government and role of the government in the economy. Within academic settings, public finance is a widely studied subject in many branches of political science, political economy and public economics. Research assesses the government revenue and government expenditure of the

Trading basics

Punishing: Gray Raven

Punishing: Gray Raven (Chinese: 战双帕弥什, lit. 'Punishing: Double Fight') is a free-to-play action role-playing game developed and published by Kuro Games. It was first released in China on December 5, 2019, in Japan on December 4, 2020, and globally on July 16, 2021. The game was released on Microsoft Windows in May 2023 and later distributed through Steam in February 2026.

Fiat currencies

Purchasing power parity

Purchasing power parity (PPP) is a measure of the price of specific goods in different countries and is used to compare the absolute purchasing power of the countries' currencies. PPP is effectively the ratio of the price of a market basket at one location divided by the price of the basket of goods at a different location. The PPP inflation and exchange rate may differ from the market e

Finance

Put option

In finance, a put or put option is a derivative instrument in financial markets that gives the holder (i.e. the purchaser of the put option) the right to sell an asset (the underlying), at a specified price (the strike), by (or on) a specified date (the expiry or maturity) to the writer (i.e. seller) of the put. The purchase of a put option is interpreted as a negative sentiment about th

Trading basics

Put–call parity

In financial mathematics, the put–call parity defines a relationship between the price of a European call option and European put option, both with the identical strike price and expiry, namely that a portfolio of a long call option and a short put option is equivalent to (and hence has the same value as) a single forward contract at this strike price and expiry. This is because if the p

Finance

Put/call ratio

In finance the put/call ratio (or put-call ratio, PCR) is a technical indicator demonstrating investor sentiment. The ratio represents a proportion between all the put options and all the call options purchased on any given day. The put/call ratio can be calculated for any individual stock, as well as for any index, or can be aggregated. For example, Cboe volume and put/call ratio data i

Trading basics

Quadriga (cryptocurrency exchange)

Quadriga Fintech Solutions was the owner and operator of QuadrigaCX. QuadrigaCX was believed to be Canada's largest cryptocurrency exchange at the time of its collapse in 2019, with the exchange ceasing operations and the company filing for bankruptcy with C$215.7 million in liabilities and about C$28 million in assets.

Finance

Quantum finance

Quantum finance is an interdisciplinary research field that applies theories and methods developed by quantum physicists and economists to finance. It is a branch of econophysics.

Trading basics

Rain (cryptocurrency exchange)

Rain is a Middle Eastern cryptocurrency exchange company that operates through its holding company, Rain Financial Inc., which oversees Rain Management W.L.L. in Bahrain,

Finance

Rainbow option

In finance, a Rainbow option is a derivative whose payoff depends on multiple underlying risky assets. Each underlying asset is referred to as a color of the rainbow. It contrasts with a simple option that is exposed to one source of uncertainty, such as the price of underlying asset.

Securities & exchanges

Ratio spread

A ratio spread or frontspread is a multi-leg options position. Like a vertical, the ratio spread involves buying and selling options on the same underlying security with different strike prices and the same expiration date. In this spread, the number of option contracts sold is not equal to a number of contracts bought. An unequal number of options contracts gives this spread certain u

Banking

Raymond A. Lamontagne

Raymond A. Lamontagne (b. November 14, 1934) is an American philanthropist. A former investment banker and president of Lano International Inc., Seavest Inc., and the Encore Company, Lamontagne has been a major financier and administrator of several prominent nonprofits. He participated in establishing the Peace Corps and later the Hole in the Wall Camp for seriously ill children, and wo

Securities & exchanges

Real estate derivative

A real estate derivative is a financial instrument whose value is based on the price of real estate. The core uses for real estate derivatives are: hedging positions, pre-investing assets and re-allocating a portfolio. The major products within real estate derivatives are: swaps, futures contracts, options (calls and puts) and structured products. Each of these products can use a differ

Finance

Real options valuation

Real options valuation, also often termed real options analysis, (ROV or ROA) applies option valuation techniques to capital budgeting decisions. A real option itself, is the right—but not the obligation—to undertake certain business initiatives, such as deferring, abandoning, expanding, staging, or contracting a capital investment project. For example, real options valuation could exami

Finance

Recovery swap

In finance, recovery swaps, recovery locks, or recovery default swaps (RDS) are derivative contracts related to credit default swaps, and reference a bond issuance as its underlying. They are designed to provide a hedge against the uncertainty of recovery in default.

Trading basics

Recruitment marketing

Recruitment marketing refers to the inbound strategies and tactics an organization uses to find, attract, engage, and nurture talent before they apply for a job, also called the pre-applicant phase of talent acquisition. It is the practice of promoting the benefits and value of working for an employer in order to recruit talent. It is analogous in many ways to corporate marketing, and

Finance

Refinancing

Refinancing is the replacement of an existing debt obligation with another debt obligation under a different term and interest rate. The terms and conditions of refinancing may vary widely by country, province, or state, based on several economic factors such as inherent risk, projected risk, political stability of a nation, currency stability, banking regulations, borrower's credit wort

Banking

Regina de Lamo

Regina de Lamo Jiménez (7 September 1870 – 17 November 1947) was a Spanish intellectual, a very versatile activist until the arrival of the Francoist dictatorship in Spain. She was a pianist, teacher of music and singing, writer, journalist, feminist proponent and activist for women's rights, promoter of the cooperative economic model, defender of syndicalism and anarchism, and propagand

Trading basics

Relative value (economics)

In finance, relative value is the attractiveness measured in terms of risk, liquidity, and return of one financial asset relative to another, or for a given instrument, of one maturity relative to another. The concept arises in economics, business and investment.

Trading basics

Remington Outdoor Company

Remington Outdoor Company, Inc. (ROC), formerly known as the Freedom Group, was an American firearms manufacturer and holding company. The company had notable brands under its umbrella, such as Bushmaster, DPMS, Remington and Marlin.

Banking

Report on a National Bank

The Second Report on the Public Credit also referred to as The Report on a National Bank was the second of three influential reports on fiscal and economic policy delivered to City Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton. The Report, submitted on December 14, 1790, called for the establishment of a central bank, its primary purpose to expand the flow of legal tender by monetizing

Banking

Report on a Plan for the Further Support of Public Credit

In United States history, the Report on a Plan for the Further Support of Public Credit is the "valedictory" report issued to the US Congress on January 16, 1795 by the first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton. In addition to defending the fiscal programs that he had imposed thus far and extolling a system of finance that was "prosperous beyond all expectations", the report en

Securities & exchanges

Repurchase agreement

A repurchase agreement, also known as a repo, RP, or sale and repurchase agreement, is a form of secured short-term borrowing, usually, though not always, using government securities as collateral. A contracting party sells a security to a lender and, by agreement between the two parties, repurchases the security back shortly afterwards, at a slightly higher contracted price. The differe

Trading basics

Retirement spend-down

At retirement, individuals stop working and no longer get employment earnings, and enter a phase of their lives, where they rely on the assets they have accumulated, to supply money for their spending needs for the rest of their lives. Retirement spend-down, or withdrawal rate, is the strategy a retiree follows to spend, decumulate or withdraw assets during retirement.

Trading basics

Revue Starlight

Revue Starlight (少女☆歌劇 レヴュースタァライト, Shōjo Kageki Revyū Sutāraito; lit. Girls' Musical Revue Starlight) is a Japanese media franchise created in 2017 by Bushiroad, Nelke Planning and Kinema Citrus. It primarily consists of a series of musicals, debuting between 22 and 24 September 2017 at the AiiA 2.5 Theater Tokyo; a 12-episode anime television series directed by Tomohiro Furukawa which a

Finance

Risk reversal

In finance, risk reversal (also known as a conversion when an investment strategy) can refer to a measure of the volatility skew or to a trading strategy.

Finance

Risk-free rate

The risk-free rate of return, usually shortened to the risk-free rate, is the rate of return of a hypothetical investment with scheduled payments over a fixed period of time that is assumed to meet all payment obligations.

Trading basics

Risk–return spectrum

The risk–return spectrum (also called the risk–return tradeoff or risk–reward) is the relationship between the amount of return gained on an investment and the amount of risk undertaken in that investment. The more return sought, the more risk that must be undertaken.

Finance

Robert A. Jarrow

Robert Alan Jarrow is the Ronald P. and Susan E. Lynch Professor of Investment Management at the Cornell Johnson Graduate School of Management. Professor Jarrow is a co-creator of the Heath–Jarrow–Morton framework for pricing interest rate derivatives, a co-creator of the reduced form Jarrow–Turnbull credit risk models employed for pricing credit derivatives, and the creator of the forw

Banking

Rothschild banking family of Austria

The Rothschild banking family of Austria (Austrian German: Rothschild Bankiersfamilie) was the Austrian branch of the Rothschild family. It was founded in 1820 by Salomon Mayer von Rothschild in Vienna, which was then part of the Austrian Empire.

Banking

Royal Canadian Mint

The Royal Canadian Mint (French: Monnaie royale canadienne) is the mint of Canada and a Crown corporation, operating under an act of parliament referred to as the Royal Canadian Mint Act. The shares of the mint are held in trust for the Crown in right of Canada.

Trading basics

Royal Mint

The Royal Mint Limited is the United Kingdom's official maker of British coins. It is currently located in Llantrisant, Wales, where it moved in 1968.

Trading basics

RSA Security

RSA Security LLC, formerly RSA Security, Inc. and trade name RSA, is an American computer and network security company with a focus on encryption and decryption standards. RSA was named after the initials of its co-founders, Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir and Leonard Adleman, after whom the RSA public key cryptography algorithm was also named. Among its products is the SecurID authentication tok

Securities & exchanges

SABR volatility model

In mathematical finance, the SABR model is a stochastic volatility model, which attempts to capture the volatility smile in derivatives markets. The name stands for "stochastic alpha, beta, rho", referring to the parameters of the model. The SABR model is widely used by practitioners in the financial industry, especially in the interest rate derivative markets. It was developed by Patric

Trading basics

Saint Helena pound

The Saint Helena pound (symbol: £; currency code: SHP) is the currency of the Atlantic islands of Saint Helena and Ascension, which are constituent parts of the British Overseas Territory of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha. It is fixed at parity with sterling, and so both currencies are commonly accepted and circulated within Saint Helena. Its base unit is the pound, which i

Trading basics

São Tomé and Príncipe dobra

The dobra (Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈdɔβɾɐ]) is the currency of São Tomé and Príncipe. It is abbreviated Db and is divided into 100 cêntimos. The first dobra (STD) was introduced in 1977, replacing the escudo at par. Due to past inflation, on 1 January 2018 the dobra was redenominated at a rate of 1000 to 1, and given the new ISO 4217 currency code STN.

Trading basics

Saul Steinberg (businessman)

Saul Phillip Steinberg (August 13, 1939 – December 7, 2012) was an American businessman and financier. He became a millionaire before his 30th birthday and a billionaire before his 40th birthday. He started a computer leasing company (Leasco), which he used in an audacious and successful takeover of the much larger Reliance Insurance Company in 1968. He was best known for his unsuccessfu

Banking

Savings bank (Spain)

In Spain, a savings bank (Spanish: caja de ahorros or informally caja, Catalan: caixa d'estalvis, also caixa, Galician: caixa de aforros, informally caixa, Basque: aurrezki kutxa) is a financial institution that specializes in accepting savings deposits and granting loans. Spanish banks fall into two categories: Privately owned banks (bancos) and government owned banks (cajas—literally

Payments & settlement

Scrip

A scrip is any substitute for legal tender.

Securities & exchanges

Scripophily

Scripophily is the study and collection of stock and bond certificates. A specialized field of numismatics, scripophily has developed as an area of collecting because of the inherent beauty of certain historical certificates, and because of interest in the historical context of many of the documents. In addition, some stock certificates serve as excellent examples of engraving. Occasiona

Banking

Second Report on Public Credit

In United States history, the Second Report on the Public Credit, also referred to as The Report on a National Bank, was the second of four influential reports on fiscal and economic policy delivered to Congress by the first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton. Submitted on December 14, 1790, the report called for the establishment of a central bank with the primary purpos

Finance

Securities market

Security market is a component of the wider financial market where securities can be bought and sold between subjects of the economy, on the basis of demand and supply. Security markets encompasses stock markets, bond markets and derivatives markets where prices can be determined and participants both professional and non professional can meet.

Finance

Securities market participants (United States)

Securities market participants in the United States include corporations and governments issuing securities, persons and corporations buying and selling a security, the broker-dealers and exchanges which facilitate such trading, banks which safe keep assets, and regulators who monitor the markets' activities. Investors buy and sell through broker-dealers and have their assets retained b

Finance

Security interest

In law and finance, a security interest is a legal right that a secured party has over secured assets. Security interests most often arise where a debtor grants an interest over collateral to a creditor to secure the loan, such that the creditor will have enforceable rights in the event of the debtor's default or non-performance.

Securities & exchanges

Settlement (finance)

Settlement is the "final step in the transfer of ownership involving the physical exchange of securities or payment". After settlement, the obligations of all the parties have been discharged and the transaction is considered complete.

Banking

Shadow banking system

The shadow banking system is the collection of non-bank financial intermediaries (NBFIs), or nondepository financial institutions (NDFIs) that legally provide services similar to traditional commercial banks but outside normal banking regulations. S&P Global estimates that, at end-2022, shadow banking held about $63 trillion in financial assets in major jurisdictions around the world, re

Trading basics

Shadow rate

The shadow rate is an interest rate in some financial models. It is used to measure the economy when nominal interest rates come close to the zero lower bound. It was created by Fischer Black in his final paper, "Interest Rates as Options".

Assets

ShapeShift

ShapeShift AG was a cryptocurrency exchange which operated from 2014 to 2021 and was headquartered in Switzerland.

Securities & exchanges

Share (finance)

A share (sometimes referred to as stock or equity) is a unit of equity ownership in the capital stock of a corporation. It can refer to units of mutual funds, limited partnerships, and real estate investment trusts. Share capital refers to all of the shares of an enterprise. The owner of shares in a company is a shareholder (or stockholder) of the corporation. A share expresses the owner

Trading basics

Shopping while black

"Shopping while black" is a phrase used for the type of marketplace discrimination that is also called "consumer racial profiling", "consumer racism" or "racial profiling in a retail setting", as it applies to black people. Shopping while black is the experience of being denied service or given poor service because one is black.

Finance

Short (finance)

In finance, being short in an asset means investing in such a way that the investor will profit if the market value of the asset falls. This is the opposite of the more common long position, where the investor will profit if the market value of the asset rises. An investor that sells an asset short is, as to that asset, a short seller.

Trading basics

Short-rate model

A short-rate model, in the context of interest rate derivatives, is a mathematical model that describes the future evolution of interest rates by describing the future evolution of the short rate, usually written

Trading basics

Silver as an investment

Silver may be held as an investment through physical bullion, bullion coins, exchange-traded products, futures and other derivatives, storage accounts, and shares of silver-mining companies. Silver has both industrial and investment demand, with uses including electrical and electronic products, photovoltaics, jewelry, silverware, coins, medals, and other industrial applications.

Trading basics

Silver Republican Party

The Silver Republican Party, later known as the Lincoln Republican Party, was a United States political party from 1896 to 1901. It was so named because it split from the Republican Party by supporting free silver (effectively, expansionary monetary policy) and bimetallism. The main Republican Party opposed free silver and supported the gold standard. The strength of the Silver Republica

Trading basics

Silverite

The Silverites were members of a political movement in the United States in the late-19th century that advocated that silver should continue to be a monetary standard along with gold, as authorized under the Coinage Act of 1792. The Silverite coalition's famous slogan was "16 to 1" – that is, the ratio of sixteen ounces of silver equal in value to one ounce of gold, a ratio similar to t

Securities & exchanges

Single-price auction

Single-price auctions are a pricing method in securities auctions that give all purchasers of an issue the same purchase price. They can be perceived as modified Dutch auctions. This method has been used since 1992 when it debuted as an experiment of the U.S. Treasury for all auctions of 2-year and 5-year notes. There is only one main difference between the multiple-price system and the

Securities & exchanges

Single-stock futures

In finance, a single-stock future (SSF) is a type of futures contract between two parties to exchange a specified number of stocks in a company for a price agreed today (the futures price or the strike price) with delivery occurring at a specified future date, the delivery date. The contracts can be later traded on a futures exchange.

Trading basics

Slippage (finance)

In finance and the stock market, slippage is the difference between the execution price expected by the trader (usually the one indicated by the trading software) and the one at which the transaction actually happens. Market impact, liquidity, and frictional costs may contribute to slippage.

Trading basics

SmartRider

SmartRider is the contactless electronic ticketing system of the Public Transport Authority of Western Australia. The system uses RFID smartcard technology to process public transport fares across public train, bus and ferry services.

Trading basics

Smokey Bones

Barbeque Integrated Inc., doing business as Smokey Bones Bar and Fire Grill (or simply Smokey Bones) was an American casual dining restaurant chain owned by FAT Brands. Its franchise headquarters are in Beverly Hills, California. In January 2026, Smokey Bones had 31 restaurants in 15 Eastern states. Under its previous owner, Smokey Bones had as many as 128 restaurants across most of the

Trading basics

Social finance

Social finance is a category of financial services that aims to leverage private capital to address challenges in areas of social and environmental need. Having gained popularity after the 2008 financial crisis, it is notable for its public benefit focus. Mechanisms of creating shared social value are not new; however, social finance is conceptually unique as an approach to solving socia

Finance

Social media use in the financial services sector

Social media in the financial services sector refers to the use of social media by the financial services sector to promote and distribute financial services. Social media is used in various aspects of the financial industry including customer service, marketing, and product development. It has enabled financial institutions to extend their reach through direct and real-time communicatio

Finance

Social trading

Social trading is a form of investing that allows investors to observe the trading behavior of their peers and expert traders. The primary objective is to follow their investment strategies using copy trading or mirror trading. Social trading requires little or no knowledge about financial markets.

Finance

South African Mint

The South African Mint is responsible for minting all coins of the South African rand on behalf of its owner, the South African Reserve Bank. Located in Centurion, Gauteng near South Africa's administrative capital Pretoria, the mint manufactures coins and planchets for both domestic and international markets.

Fiat currencies

South African rand

The South African rand, or simply the rand, (sign: R; code: ZAR) is the official currency of South Africa. It is subdivided into 100 cents (sign: "c"), a comma separates the rand and cents.

Finance

Speculative attack

In economics, a speculative attack is a precipitous selling of untrustworthy assets by previously inactive speculators and the corresponding acquisition of some valuable assets (currencies, gold). The first model of a speculative attack was contained in a 1975 discussion paper on the gold market by Stephen Salant and Dale Henderson at the Federal Reserve Board. Paul Krugman, who visited

Trading basics

Sports betting

Sports betting is the activity of predicting sports results and placing a wager on the outcome.

Finance

Spot contract

In finance, a spot contract, spot transaction, or simply spot, is a contract of buying or selling a commodity, security or currency for immediate settlement (payment and delivery) on the spot date, which is normally two business days after the trade date. The settlement price (or rate) is called spot price (or spot rate). A spot contract is in contrast with a forward contract or futures

Securities & exchanges

Spread option

In finance, a spread option is a type of option where the payoff is based on the difference in price between two underlying assets. For example, the two assets could be crude oil and heating oil; trading such an option might be of interest to oil refineries, whose profits are a function of the difference between these two prices. Spread options are generally traded over the counter, rath

Banking

Standard Catalog of World Paper Money

The Standard Catalog of World Paper Money was a well-known catalogue of banknotes that was published by Krause Publications in three volumes. These catalogues are commonly known in the numismatic trade as the Pick catalogues, as the numbering system was originally compiled by Albert Pick, but are also referred to as "Krause" or "SCWPM". Since the mid-1980s the titles have been owned by K

Trading basics

State Street Investment Management

State Street Investment Management (formerly State Street Global Advisors) is the asset management arm of State Street Corporation founded in 1978 and the world's fourth largest asset manager, with nearly US$4.1 trillion in assets under management as of December 31, 2023. State Street Investment Management operates as a subsidiary of State Street Bank and Trust Company.

Finance

Statistical finance

Statistical finance is the application of econophysics to financial markets. Instead of the normative roots of finance, it uses a positivist framework. It includes exemplars from statistical physics with an emphasis on emergent or collective properties of financial markets. Empirically observed stylized facts are the starting point for this approach to understanding financial markets.

Trading basics

Stochastic oscillator

Stochastic oscillator is a momentum indicator within technical analysis that uses support and resistance levels as an oscillator. George Lane developed this indicator in the late 1950s. The term stochastic refers to the point of a current price in relation to its price range over a period of time. This method attempts to predict price turning points by comparing the closing price of a

Finance

Stochastic partial differential equation

In mathematics, stochastic partial differential equations (SPDEs) are a generalization of partial differential equations via random force terms and coefficients, in the same way ordinary stochastic differential equations generalize ordinary differential equations.

Securities & exchanges

Stochastic volatility

In statistics, stochastic volatility models are those in which the variance of a stochastic process is itself randomly distributed. They are used in the field of mathematical finance to evaluate derivative securities, such as options. The name derives from the models' treatment of the underlying security's volatility as a random process, governed by state variables such as the price leve

Trading basics

Stock

Stocks (also capital stock, or sometimes interchangeably, shares) consist of all the shares by which ownership of a corporation or company is divided. A single share of the stock means fractional ownership of the corporation in proportion to the total number of shares. This typically entitles the shareholder (stockholder) to that fraction of the company's earnings, proceeds from liquidat