inauguration – noun

[Origin: Latin inaugurare "to consecrate by augury."]

A formal ceremony in which an official is installed into his post after the careful observation of the flight and caws of pundits.

bad bank – noun

1. A bank that accurately accounts for the worth of its assets.

2. A warehouse for toxic sludge and other noxious products of value creators.

downsizing – noun

A growth industry with exceedingly low labor costs, thanks to its unique ability to create and educate its own pool of experienced, desperate job applicants, through the very service it provides.



From Valleywag.

feeder fund – noun

A private investment fund that, for a 1.5% fee, exercises the due diligence of passing its money pool to other funds whose managers seem to know something about finance.

finance – noun

Alchemy; hermetics. A magical power, practice, or process whereby mundane things are transformed into objects of great value.


Finance

globalization – noun (reprise)

The interconnectedness of the world's economies and their susceptibility to American-style financial fraud.

When America sneezes, the world catches a cold.

market – noun

A place where marks and their money are soon parted.

The great virtue of a free market system is that it does not care what color people are; it does not care what their religion is; it only cares whether they can produce something you want to acquire. — Milton Friedman, slightly modified.

quant – noun

(Abbr. "quantitative analyst")

A mathematical expert who formulates complex models for the securities trade that predict gains with near certainty, assuming the soundness of the variables inputted by Ivy League arts-and-sciences majors.

COMMENT: "Quant" also means "a punting pole with a broad flange near the end to prevent it from sinking into the mud." In the financial industry, the rise of quants similarly prevented investor speculation from sinking into the mathematical sludge generated by risk aversion and due diligence. Thus, the origin of the term.

Investment banking isn’t this advanced math, these advanced quantitative techniques. There’s Excel for that. Investment banking is really just critical thinking. They way I put it, if you’re good at Sudoku, you’ll be a good investment banker.

risk management – noun

The art or practice of formulating complex exculpatory explanations for enormous losses incurred from daft speculation.

(See also: "crisis management.")

asset – noun

A valuable possession or trait that thereby marks its owner as worthy of other-regarding concern.

due diligence - noun

The oversight appropriate to a money-making opportunity, i.e. cost-cutting and maximally efficient. Whatever supervision is sufficient to allay investors without expending further time and money.

troubled – adjective

Worthless, nugatory; bogus.

(See also distressed, toxic, illiquid.)

COMMENT: "Troubled asset" is, strictly speaking, a contradiction in terms.

bridge loan – noun

Short-term financing that takes a company from one insolvent shore, safely spans the turbid waters of liquidation, and delivers it to the opposite insolvent shore.

pension fund – noun

An investment pool set aside by an employer to serve as collateral for a leveraged buyout.

securitize – verb

1. To purchase, facelift, and flip a set of mortgages or loans.

2. To pass the buck, to dodge, to cop out.

deposit – noun

Money placed at a bank as collateral for highly leveraged investments.

COMMENT: Deposits are insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, which is backed by the full faith and credit of the United States government. This is perhaps why Americans have an exceedingly low savings rate.

bankruptcy – noun

1. (individual) A state of moral degeneracy, in which a person willfully and without conscience incurs debt he cannot repay.

2. (corporate) A brief period of financial restructuring; a fiscal hiccup.

executive compensation – noun

Payment to an executive for loss or suffering incurred from interaction with middle management, staff, and other rabble.

rating agency – noun

An advertising firm that specializes in the sale of bonds.

Issuers thus were forced to seek credit ratings (or else their bonds would not be marketable). The agencies—realizing they had a hot product and, what's more, a captive market—started charging the very organizations whose bonds they were rating. — Roger Lowenstein

incentivize – verb

(Also: "incent")

To entice someone to do something he would normally abhor, such as acting for the good of the public or of the company for which he works.