Securities is a term used to describe different types of investments

Alternative investments can be sorted into seven major categories, according to some experts

These categories include real estate, private equity, private debt, hedge funds, collectibles, and more.

Investors can buy three main types of bonds: government, corporate, and municipal

Each type has variations of its bond offerings with different interest rates, loan lengths, maturity dates, and terms. Each type also carries its own risks and rewards.

The bond market is where bonds and other debt securities are traded

Bonds are fixed-income investments allowing individuals to lend a specific amount of money to a large entity, like a government or corporation, for a set amount of time in return for interest paid out over the life of the loan. The bond market is widely considered a key economic barometer.

Mutual fund share classes are rankings of different types of services for investors

The more services an investor has, the more expensive of a class they’re in. While investors are all technically investing in the same securities with the same investment strategy, different classes dictate extra services and attention given to investors, which can seriously impact an investor’s returns.

A 'position' in financial markets refers to the amount of a security or asset that an investor owns or sells short

A "long" position gains from an increase in a security's price, whereas a "short" position profits from a price drop. This article includes a detailed explanation of the term "position" as it relates to investing and financial markets.

Capital assets include investments from stocks to fine jewelry

Capital assets can be classified as property owned and used for personal or investment reasons. If a capital asset grows in value and the holder decides to sell it, their “capital gains” would be roughly the difference between the original purchase price and the amount of money they sold the asset for.

Tranches slice financial products into segments

Specifically, tranches are slices of securities (think: bonds or mortgages) divided by risk and characteristics to attract different investors with a variety of risk tolerances.

Retail investors are individuals who trade stock for themselves

Institutional investors, on the other hand, are investing for someone else. There are big differences between the two, one being that institutional investors can be granted certain special treatment (like being able to purchase IPOs right away).

Securitization has become common practice in home financing

When a homebuyer finances with a lender, they aren’t necessarily the one footing the bill. After a buyer secures a home loan, the lender can sell the loan to another financial institution or a private institution. That group can later sell that mortgage to investors. This is called securitization.

The difference between stocks and bonds

While more people invest in stocks than bonds, experts say owning both can make for a healthier portfolio. Stocks are considered a riskier investment than bonds, but tend to have higher returns. While bonds might be the safer option, they won’t grow your wealth as quickly.

It’s an investment banker’s job to raise money for the bank’s clients

Investment bankers do this in a multitude of ways, such as selling securities, or acquiring other companies.

Shares are parts of a stock that represent ownership of a company

Shares are traded on the stock market. Once you buy a single share of a company, you are considered a shareholder of that company and may have certain rights as a partial owner, such as voting on business decisions.

SAFE is a financial tool that stands for ‘simple agreement for future equity’

In the first part of a two-part series, SAFEs are explained as a way angel investors safeguard their investment in a startup. These agreements outline equity expectations.

Certificates of deposit are investment vehicles that earn interest on a fixed sum of money over a set term

CDs come in varying term lengths, from three- or six-month commitments to decadelong terms. Typically, the longer the term, the higher the interest rate.

How to invest in silver

This article explains the value of silver as an investment opportunity—and explains the different ways you can invest in the asset. It also outlines the pros and cons of silver as an investment. To learn more about investing in silver, read this article.

Annuities are regulated at the state level

However, certain types of annuities, like indexed annuities, are also nationally regulated by the SEC and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to protect investors.

40 key stock market terms, explained

Liquidity. Forex. Capitalization. Blue chip stocks. These are just a few pieces of stock market vocabulary most people who don't spend all day on a trading floor might not know. Thankfully, we found a fun infographic that makes it easier to learn what 40 key stock market terms mean and why each of them matters.

Investors rely on the S&P 500 as a benchmark for the state of the economy

Since the index represents a broad range of diverse industries, it's become a proxy for the market itself and a common benchmark for investors to compare returns and performance patterns against. Generally speaking, when someone says a stock is under- or out-performing the market, that actually means under- or out-performing the S&P 500. The S&P 500 is exchange-agnostic, and includes companies listed on both the NYSE and Nasdaq.

Hedge funds, the private investment firms that trade a wide swath of financial assets, make money by imposing steep fees on investors and from the fund's investment performance.

Commodities have to meet specific specifications to be classified as commodities

In the financial sense of the term, commodities must be uniform, interchangeable, and deliverable to meet the classification. That's partly why a crop grown in your backyard might not qualify as a commodity crop.

Why the SEC was started

The Securities and Exchange Commission was created during the Great Depression to restore public trust in financial markets after the 1929 crash. Established in 1934, it enforces transparency, investigates fraud, and protects investors by requiring companies to disclose accurate information and holding violators accountable.

Learn how to read a prospectus, the juicy document that any company must file with the SEC before going public

A prospectus typically contains information about the company's operations, including details about its management team and their compensation, financial statements, how it intends to use any capital raised by the IPO, and more. While these documents can be dense and lengthy, experts say that some of the most important sections of a prospectus for investors to look at include the risk factors section and the use of proceeds section.

Technically speaking, a 401(k) is a type of pension

The Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 lumped both defined-contribution plans like 401(k) plans, and defined benefit plans (like what is colloquially known as a pension) under the term “pension” in order to protect workers and make retirement plan enforcement simpler. Learn more about the ERISA here.

In 2021, Social Security began drawing down trust fund reserves to help pay for benefits

The Social Security trust funds are invested solely in US Treasury bonds. Any Social Security tax revenue surplus has historically been invested in these bonds, which are non-marketable securities available only to trust funds. The interest on these investments also contributes to program income.

Trademarks are just one type of intellectual property

Intellectual property refers to any intangible "creation of the mind," which includes ideas, creative works, and even trade secrets. Trademarks, copyright, and patents are all protected by intellectual property laws—but each protection is separate and distinct.

Learn more about the four main market structures

In modern economic theory, there are four main market structures. Under each market structure, firms (or businesses) have differing levels of competition and reach different levels of price efficiency based on the consumer's willingness to pay for a product or service.

An initial public offering or 'IPO' is the process of a private company becoming public by putting shares of the company on the stock market for purchase.

While the first exchange-traded fund (a 'basket' of different assets that can be bought and sold on a stock exchange) in the US only launched in 1993, the global ETF market has grown to more than $10T in the short time since.

Memecoins are a type of cryptocurrency—a form of digital currency with a wide variety of uses—created around popular 'memes,' or viral internet jokes.

The Nasdaq's 'Magnificent 7' companies are responsible for roughly 40% of the Nasdaq 100 index's gains, while the remaining 93 companies account for the other 60%.

Watch this video that uses Lego bricks to explain how venture capital works.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

The United States is one of only around two dozen countries with a fully federal system of government, in which power is divided between national and state governments.

Some coin denominations have ridges etched on their sides, partly to prevent counterfeiting, in a practice called 'reeding.'

Corals are themselves not coral reefs—the term refers to the tiny marine invertebrates that build the rigid reef.

The price of gas is a composite made up of several different factors, with the federal gas tax making up less than 20% of what drivers pay at the pump.

The first steps to rebuilding your credit score include getting to know exactly what's on your credit report and figuring out how far you are from the '700 club,' or 'good score' range.

'Silent' fireworks have gained more interest in recent years as a quieter celebratory option.

Animal phobias are likely the most common type of phobias, followed by an extreme fear of heights.

Art theft is the third-largest source of criminal revenues worldwide, thanks in part to the subjective nature of valuing a work of art.

Shooting stars, or meteors, are fragments of asteroids and comets that burn up as they enter Earth's atmosphere, creating streaks in the sky called meteor showers.

Some renewable energy sources may weaken the resiliency of electric grids by removing outage buffers provided by coal- and natural gas-fired plants, which provide the system with more time to find a new power source if a plant goes down.

Browse a detailed visual analysis of over 200,000 similes—comparisons that often use 'like' or 'as'—from popular fiction to see how frequently writers the same idiomatic expressions.

The American Society of Civil Engineers' infrastructure report card gave the US a C in 2025, its highest grade since the project launched in 1998.

Sony set the standard for cylinder-shaped batteries when it repurposed manufacturing equipment used to make rolls of magnetic recording tape.

Chaos theory—informally known as the butterfly effect—is the reason why weather forecasts are presented with probabilities rather than certainties.

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

Explore what it's like inside a patient isolation unit, used in situations such as treating a patient or suspected patient with Ebola.

A Yale student wrote a profound essay about the consulting industry's influence on elite college students that was published in a book of her writing after she died in a post-graduation car accident.

Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps is independent of Iran's regular army and is one of the most powerful and influential military-political organizations in the Middle East.