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Trading basics

Algorithmic trading

Algorithmic trading is a method of executing orders using automated pre-programmed trading instructions accounting for variables such as time, price, and volume. This type of trading attempts to leverage the speed and computational resources of computers relative to human traders. In the twenty-first century, algorithmic trading has been gaining traction with both retail and institutiona

Trading basics

Basis risk

Basis risk in finance is the risk associated with imperfect hedging due to the variables or characteristics that affect the difference between the futures contract and the underlying "cash" position. It arises because of the difference between the price of the asset to be hedged and the price of the asset serving as the hedge before expiration, namely b = S - F. Barring idiosyncratic inf

Finance

Budget Committee (Germany)

In the Federal Republic of Germany, the federal parliament (Bundestag) and all state parliaments (Landtage) have established Budget Committees (Haushaltsausschuss), standing parliamentary committees generally responsible for deliberations on the budget act and for parliamentary oversight of budget execution.

Securities & exchanges

Cashflow matching

Cash flow matching is a process of hedging in which a company or other entity matches its cash outflows (i.e., financial obligations) with its cash inflows over a given time horizon. It is a subset of immunization strategies in finance. Cash flow matching is of particular importance to defined benefit pension plans.

Finance

Central counterparty clearing

A central clearing counterparty (CCP), also referred to as a central counterparty, is a financial market infrastructure organization that takes on counterparty credit risk between parties to a transaction and provides clearing and settlement services for trades in foreign exchange, securities, options, and derivative contracts. CCPs are highly regulated institutions that specialize in ma

Finance

Concentration risk

Concentration risk is a banking term describing the level of risk in a bank's portfolio arising from concentration to a single counterparty, sector or country.

Trading basics

Consumer credit risk

The following article is based on UK market; other countries may differ.

Finance

Corvinus International Investment Ltd.

Corvinus International Investment Ltd. is a Hungarian state-owned asset management company. It is responsible for the execution of transactions related to company holdings in line with the strategic objectives of economic development and for the preservation and growth of the assets owned by the company.

Finance

Country risk

Country risk refers to the risk of investing or lending in a country, arising from possible changes in the business environment that may adversely affect operating profits or the value of assets in the country. For example, financial factors such as currency controls, devaluation or regulatory changes, or stability factors such as mass riots, civil war and other potential events contribu

Finance

Crossing network

A crossing network is an alternative trading system (ATS) that matches buy and sell orders electronically for execution without first routing the order to an exchange or other public displayed market such as an electronic communication network (ECN). Such crossing networks are a type of dark pool that employ computerized systems to match buyers and sellers of large blocks of shares with

Trading basics

Crypto-to-Crypto Trading: Trading Pairs and Order Basics

Crypto-to-crypto trading generally refers to the buying and selling between different crypto assets. This article introduces positioning, mechanisms, usage verification, and common misconceptions.

Assets

Cryptojacking

Cryptojacking is the act of exploiting a computer to mine cryptocurrencies, often through websites, against the user's will or while the user is unaware. One notable piece of software used for cryptojacking was Coinhive, which was used in over two-thirds of cryptojacks before its March 2019 shutdown. The cryptocurrencies mined the most often are privacy coins—coins with hidden transactio

Finance

Deposit risk

Deposit risk is a type of liquidity risk of a financial institution that is generated by deposits either with defined maturity dates (then such deposits are called 'time' or 'term' deposits) or without defined maturity dates (then such deposits are called 'demand' or 'non-maturity' deposits).

Finance

Drawdown (economics)

The drawdown is the measure of the decline from a historical peak in some variable (typically the cumulative profit or total open equity of a financial trading strategy).

Trading basics

Equity risk

Equity risk is "the financial risk involved in holding equity in a particular investment." Equity risk is a type of market risk that applies to investing in shares. The market price of stocks fluctuates all the time, depending on supply and demand. The risk of losing money due to a reduction in the market price of shares is known as equity risk.

Securities & exchanges

European Market Infrastructure Regulation

The European Market Infrastructure Regulation (EMIR) is an EU regulation aimed at reducing systemic counterparty and operational risk and thereby preventing future financial system collapses. Its focus is regulation of over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives, central counterparties and trade repositories. It provides steer on reporting of derivative contracts, implementation of risk managemen

Trading basics

Exchange: Exchange Rates, Fees, and Received Amounts

An exchange is the process of acquiring one asset using another. This article introduces definition, mechanics, usage verification, and common misconceptions.

Finance

Expected return

The expected return (or expected gain) on a financial investment is the expected value of its return (of the profit on the investment). It is a measure of the center of the distribution of the random variable that is the return. It is calculated by using the following formula:

Finance

Financial risk modeling

Financial risk modeling is the use of formal mathematical and econometric techniques to measure, monitor and control the market risk, credit risk, and operational risk on a firm's balance sheet, on a bank's accounting ledger of tradeable financial assets, or of a fund manager's portfolio value; see Financial risk management.

Fiat currencies

Foreign exchange risk

Foreign exchange risk (also known as FX risk, exchange rate risk or currency risk) is a financial risk that exists when a financial transaction is denominated in a currency other than the domestic currency of the company. The exchange risk arises when there is a risk of an unfavourable change in exchange rate between the domestic currency and the denominated currency before the date when

Trading basics

Fund administration

Fund administration is the name given to the execution of back office activities including fund accounting, financial reporting, net asset value calculation, capital calls, distributions, investor communications and other functions carried out in support of an investment fund, which may take the form of a traditional mutual fund, a hedge fund, a private equity fund, a venture capital fun

Trading basics

GAIN Capital

GAIN Capital Holdings, Inc. was a US-based provider of online trading services, headquartered in Warren, New Jersey until it was acquired by StoneX Group in 2020. The company provided market access and trade execution services in foreign exchange, contracts for difference (CFDs) and exchange-based products to retail and institutional investors. Trading was provided via one of two electr

Securities & exchanges

ICE Clear Credit

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.

Securities & exchanges

Instinet

Instinet Incorporated is an institutional, agency-model broker that also serves as the independent equity trading arm of its parent, Nomura Group. It executes trades for asset management firms, hedge funds, insurance companies, mutual funds and pension funds. Headquartered in New York City, the company provides sales trading services and trading technologies such as the Newport EMS, algo

Securities & exchanges

Interactive Brokers

Interactive Brokers Group, Inc. (commonly known as Interactive Brokers or IBKR) is an American multinational brokerage and financial services company headquartered in Greenwich, Connecticut. Through its subsidiaries, it provides automated trade execution and custody services for stocks, options, futures, foreign exchange, bonds, funds and other products on electronic markets worldwide. I

Trading basics

Interest rate risk

Interest rate risk refers to the potential for financial loss due to fluctuations in interest rates. It will, in turn, impact differently re market risk, i.e. impacting instruments such as Bonds, re banks and re insurers.

Finance

Internal contradictions of capital accumulation

The internal contradictions of capital accumulation is an essential concept of crisis theory, which is associated with Marxist economic theory. While the same phenomenon is described in neoclassical economic theory, in that literature it is referred to as systemic risk.

Securities & exchanges

International Swaps and Derivatives Association

The International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA ) is a trade organization of participants in the market for over-the-counter derivatives. It is headquartered in New York City.

Finance

Judgment defaulter

In China, judgment defaulter (Chinese: 失信被执行人) or court defaulters, commonly known as laolai (Chinese: 老赖) or untrustworthy person (Chinese: 失信人), is defined as a person who is able to fulfill legal obligations determined by the court, but has refused to do so, or illegally tries to evade enforcement such as hiding their assets.

Finance

Legal risk

Legal risk as a subset of operational risk that comprises the uncertainty associated with a business becoming a subjects of legal liability and obligations as a result of its operation.

Banking

Liquidity at risk

Liquidity at risk (LaR) is a financial risk measure that estimates the potential net cash outflows an institution may face over a specified time horizon and confidence level. It is designed to quantify the risk that a bank, investment fund, or corporation will be unable to meet its short-term obligations due to unexpected demands on liquidity. The concept is closely related to Value at R

Finance

Liquidity risk

Liquidity risk is a financial risk that for a certain period of time a given financial asset, security or commodity cannot be traded quickly enough in the market without impacting the market price.

Trading basics

List of bank stress tests

This list covers formal bank stress testing programs, as implemented by major regulators worldwide. It does not cover bank proprietary, internal testing programs.

Finance

Margin at risk

The Margin-at-Risk (MaR) is a quantity used to manage short-term liquidity risks due to variation of margin requirements, i.e. it is a financial risk occurring when trading commodities. It is similar to the Value-at-Risk (VaR), but instead of simulating EBIT it returns a quantile of the (expected) cash flow distribution.

Finance

Market maker

A market maker or liquidity provider is a company or individual that quotes both a buy and a sell price in a tradable asset held in inventory, hoping to make a profit on the difference, which is called the bid–ask spread or turn. This stabilizes the market, reducing price variation (volatility) by setting a trading price range for the asset.

Trading basics

Market portfolio

Market portfolio is an investment portfolio that theoretically consisting of a weighted sum of every asset in the market, with weights in the proportions that they exist in the market, with the necessary assumption that these assets are infinitely divisible.

Trading basics

Marketing activation

Marketing activation is the execution of the marketing mix as part of the marketing process. The activation phase typically comes after the planning phase during which managers plan their marketing activities and is followed by a feedback phase in which results are evaluated with marketing analytics.

Trading basics

Markets in Financial Instruments Directive 2014

Markets in Financial Instruments Directive 2014 (2014/65/EU, commonly known as MiFID 2) is a directive of the European Union (EU). Together with Regulation No 600/2014 it provides a legal framework for securities markets, investment intermediaries, in addition to trading venues. The directive provides harmonised regulation for investment services of the member states of the European Econ

Finance

Ministry of Economy and Finance (Peru)

The Ministry of Economy and Finance (Spanish: Ministerio de Economía y Finanzas, MEF) of Peru is the government ministry responsible for the planning and execution of economic policies of the Peruvian government with the goal of optimizing the economic and financial activities of the state, establish macroeconomic activity, and achieve the sustainable growth of the nation's economy.

Finance

Ministry of Finance (Afghanistan)

The Ministry of Finance of Afghanistan (Dari: وزارت مالیه افغانستان, Pashto: د افغانستان د مالیې وزارت) is responsible for the implementation and execution of the budget, collection of taxes, organization, and control of public expenses in Afghanistan; it also controls the management of the Custom Affairs. It is located next to the Pashtunistan Square in the Wazir Akbar Khan neighborhood

Finance

Model risk

In finance, model risk is the risk of loss resulting from using insufficiently accurate models to make decisions, originally and frequently in the context of valuing financial securities.

Trading basics

Mutual funds in India

The first introduction of a mutual fund in India occurred in 1963, when the Government of India launched the Unit Trust of India (UTI). Mutual funds are broadly categorised into three segments: equity funds, hybrid funds, and debt funds.

Trading basics

Nasdaq

The Nasdaq Stock Market is an American stock exchange. It is the largest stock exchange by market capitalization and the first fully electronic stock market. Based in Manhattan, New York City, the exchange is among the most active stock trading venues by volume in the United States.

Trading basics

Pairs trade

A pairs trade or pair trading is a market neutral trading strategy enabling traders to profit from virtually any market conditions: uptrend, downtrend, or sideways movement. This strategy is categorized as a statistical arbitrage and convergence trading strategy. Pair trading was pioneered by Gerry Bamberger and later led by Nunzio Tartaglia's quantitative group at Morgan Stanley in the

Finance

Payment for order flow

Payment for order flow (PFOF) is the compensation that a stockbroker receives from a market maker in exchange for the broker routing its clients' trades to that market maker. The market maker profits from the spread (the difference between purchase price and sale price) and rebates a portion of this profit to the routing broker as PFOF. Some of this benefit may be passed on to the retail

Finance

Political risk

Political risk is a type of risk faced by investors, corporations, and governments that political decisions, events, or conditions will significantly affect the profitability of a business actor or the expected value of a given economic action. Political risk can be understood and managed with reasoned foresight and investment.

Finance

Portfolio manager

A portfolio manager (PM) is a professional responsible for making investment decisions and carrying out investment activities on behalf of vested individuals or institutions. Clients invest their money for future growth, such as a retirement fund, endowment fund, or education fund. PMs work with a team of analysts and researchers and are responsible for establishing an investment strateg

Trading basics

Product marketing

Product marketing is a "core business function that plans and executes how a product is positioned, priced, and promoted to a defined audience. It aims to generate demand and support sustainable growth through activities such as positioning, packaging, and pricing, and go-to-market execution," as stated by A.H. Mujumder.

Finance

Profit at risk

Profit-at-Risk (PaR) is a risk management quantity most often used for electricity portfolios that contain some mixture of generation assets, trading contracts and end-user consumption. It is used to provide a measure of the downside risk to profitability of a portfolio of physical and financial assets, analysed by time periods in which the energy is delivered. For example, the expected

Finance

Profit risk

Profit risk is a risk management tool that focuses on understanding concentrations within the income statement and assessing the risk associated with those concentrations from a net income perspective.

Assets

Proof of personhood

Proof of personhood (PoP) is a means of resisting malicious attacks on peer-to-peer networks, particularly attacks that use multiple fake identities, otherwise known as a Sybil attack. Decentralized online platforms are particularly vulnerable to such attacks by their very nature, as notionally democratic and responsive to large voting blocks. In PoP, each unique human participant obtain

Trading basics

Replicating portfolio

In mathematical finance, a replicating portfolio for a given asset or series of cash flows is a portfolio of assets with the same properties (especially cash flows). This is meant in two distinct senses: static replication, where the portfolio has the same cash flows as the reference asset (and no changes need to be made to maintain this), and dynamic replication, where the portfolio doe

Finance

Reputational damage

Reputational damage is the loss to financial capital, social capital and/or market share resulting from damage to an organization's reputation. This is often measured in lost revenue, increased operating, capital or regulatory costs, or destruction of shareholder value. Ethics violations, safety issues, security issues, a lack of sustainability, poor quality, and lack of or unethical inn

Finance

Risk of ruin

Risk of ruin is a concept in gambling, insurance, and finance relating to the likelihood of losing all one's investment capital or extinguishing one's bankroll below the minimum for further play. For instance, if someone bets all their money on a simple coin toss, the risk of ruin is 50%. In a multiple-bet scenario, risk of ruin accumulates with the number of bets: each play increases th

Finance

Risk parity

Risk parity (or risk premia parity) is an approach to investment management which focuses on allocation of risk, usually defined as volatility, rather than allocation of capital. The risk parity approach asserts that when asset allocations are adjusted (leveraged or deleveraged) to the same risk level, the risk parity portfolio can achieve a higher Sharpe ratio and can be more resistant

Finance

Risk-adjusted return on capital

Risk-adjusted return on capital (RAROC) is a risk-based profitability measurement framework for analysing risk-adjusted financial performance and providing a consistent view of profitability across businesses. The concept was developed by Bankers Trust and principal designer Dan Borge in the late 1970s. Note, however, that increasingly return on risk-adjusted capital (RORAC) is used as a

Trading basics

Root Cause Analysis Solver Engine

Root Cause Analysis Solver Engine (informally RCASE) is a proprietary algorithm developed from research originally at the Warwick Manufacturing Group (WMG) at Warwick University. RCASE development commenced in 2003 to provide an automated version of root cause analysis, the method of problem solving that tries to identify the root causes of faults or problems. RCASE is now owned by the s

Securities & exchanges

Settlement risk

Settlement risk, also known as delivery risk or counterparty risk, is the risk that a counterparty (or intermediary agent) fails to deliver a security or its value in cash as per agreement after the first party has delivered the security or cash value. The term covers factors incidental to the settlement process that may suspend or prevent a trade from completing, even should the partie

Finance

Shape risk

Shape risk in finance is a type of basis risk when hedging a load profile with standard hedging products having a lower granularity. In other words, a commodity supplier wants to pre-purchase supplies for expected demand, but can only buy in fixed amounts that are bigger or smaller than the demand forecasted. This means it has to either over order or under order and make up the differe

Finance

Sharpe ratio

In finance, the Sharpe ratio (also known as the Sharpe index, the Sharpe measure, and the reward-to-variability ratio) measures the performance of an investment such as a security or portfolio compared to a risk-free asset, after adjusting for its risk. It is defined as the difference between the returns of the investment and the risk-free return, divided by the standard deviation of the

Trading basics

Situation analysis

In strategic management, situation analysis refers to a collection of methods that managers use to analyze an organization's internal and external environment to understand the organization's capabilities, customers, and business environment. The situation analysis can include several methods of analysis such as the 5C analysis, SWOT analysis and Porter's five forces analysis.

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.

Finance

Sortino ratio

The Sortino ratio measures the risk-adjusted return of an investment asset, portfolio, or strategy. It is a modification of the Sharpe ratio but penalizes only those returns falling below a user-specified target or required rate of return, while the Sharpe ratio penalizes both upside and downside variance equally. Though both ratios measure an investment's risk-adjusted return, they do s

Finance

Spread trade

In finance, a spread trade (also known as a relative value trade) is the simultaneous purchase of one security and sale of a related security, called legs, as a unit. Spread trades are usually executed with options or futures contracts as the legs, but other securities are sometimes used. They are executed to yield an overall net position whose value, called the spread, depends on the di

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.

Trading basics

Stress test (financial)

In finance, a stress test is an analysis or simulation designed to determine the ability of a given financial instrument or financial institution to deal with an economic crisis. Instead of doing financial projection on a "best estimate" basis, a company or its regulators may do stress testing where they look at how robust a financial instrument is in certain crashes, a form of scenario

Finance

Subhash Chandra–LIC Housing Finance loan fraud case

Subhash Chandra–LIC Housing Finance loan fraud case is a major financial scandal in India involving the diversion of bank loans and money laundering by Subhash Chandra, the promoter of Essel Group.

Trading basics

Supply chain management

In commerce, supply chain management (SCM) deals with a system of procurement (purchasing raw materials/components), operations management, logistics and marketing channels, through which raw materials can be developed into finished products and delivered to their end customers. A more narrow definition of supply chain management is the "design, planning, execution, control, and monitori

Securities & exchanges

Swap execution facility

A swap execution facility (SEF) (sometimes swaps execution facility) is a platform for financial swap trading that provides pre-trade information (i.e. bid and offer prices) and a mechanism for executing swap transactions among eligible participants.

Finance

Systematic risk

In finance and economics, systematic risk (in economics often called aggregate risk or undiversifiable risk) is vulnerability to events which affect aggregate outcomes such as broad market returns, total economy-wide resource holdings, or aggregate income. In many contexts, events like earthquakes, epidemics and major weather catastrophes pose aggregate risks that affect not only the dis

Finance

Systemic risk

In finance, systemic risk is the risk of collapse of an entire financial system or entire market, as opposed to the risk associated with any one individual entity, group or component of a system, that can be contained therein without harming the entire system. It can be defined as "financial system instability, potentially catastrophic, caused or exacerbated by idiosyncratic events or co

Finance

Systemically important financial institution

A systemically important financial institution (SIFI) is a bank, insurance company, or other financial institution whose failure might trigger a financial crisis. They are colloquially referred to as "too big to fail".

Finance

Tracking error

In finance, tracking error or active risk is a measure of the risk in an investment portfolio that is due to active management decisions made by the portfolio manager; it indicates how closely a portfolio follows the index to which it is benchmarked. The best measure is the standard deviation of the difference between the portfolio and index returns.

Finance

Turquoise (trading platform)

Turquoise is an equities trading platform (multilateral trading facility or MTF), created by nine major investment banks in 2008. The aim was to provide dealing services at a 50% discount to traditional exchanges. It is a hybrid system that allows trading both on and off traditional exchanges. The system was advertised as a "pan-European platform based in London".

Finance

Valuation risk

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.

Securities & exchanges

Volatility risk

Volatility risk

Trading basics

Volume risk

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.