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New dictionary words: How well do you know this year’s finance entries?
Hear ye, hear ye, financial wordsmiths – the 12th edition of the Collins English Dictionary was out yesterday, and with it 50,000 new words to add to your Scrabble repertoire.
The financial crisis has definitely taken hold at Collins HQ, with 14 new financial additions to the dictionary, including Fed chief Janet Yellen's ever-popular "taper" – plus, er, "The Shard".
It's not all City-focused, of course. "Twerk" has also been added. Thank goodness. And "photobomb".
Think you know your fiscal cliff from your capex? Test yourself with Collins' 14 new financial terms:
- boom-bust, n. relating to a supposed cycle in which periods of prosperity and growth alternate with periods of recession
- boomlet, n. a small, short-lived, economic boom
- capex, n. abbr. capital expenditure
- collaterize, v. to treat (a security) as collateral
- fiscal cliff, n. a situation in which sudden changes in government expenditure and taxation have a profound effect on a country's economy
- gainsharing, v. a system in which employees are financially rewarded for reducing operating costs and working more efficiently. The reward may or may not be in relation to individual performance
- man-day, n. a day regarded as the number of hours' work one person can compete
- microcap, adj. (of investments) involving a very small amount of capital
- microloan, n. a very small loan
- midcap. adj. (of investments) involving a medium amount of capital
- near-market, adj. (of rates and amounts) similar to the market rate or amount
- stress test, n. a simulation designed to show how a person or thing functions when affected by adverse circumstances
- taper, v. (of an amount of something, esp money) to decrease or to be decreased gradually; (of a central bank) to reduce or decrease activity, esp the supply and regulation of credit
- underperform, v. (of a stock or share) to yield a lower return than (the market as a whole)