Structured finance

Structured finance is a sector of finance that was created to help transfer risk using complex legal and corporate entities. This transfer of risk, as applied to the securitization of various financial assets (mortgages, credit card receivables, auto loans, etc.), has helped provide increased liquidity or funding sources to markets like housing and to transfer risk to buyers of structured products; it also permits financial institutions to remove certain assets from their balance sheets as well as provides a means for investors to gain access to diversified asset classes. However, it arguably contributed to the degradation in underwriting standards for these financial assets, which helped give rise to both the inflationary credit bubble of the mid-2000s and the credit crash and Financial crisis of 2007–08.

Common examples of instruments created through securitization include collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) and asset-backed securities (ABS).

Structure

Securitization

Finance

Finance is a field that deals with the study of investments. It includes the dynamics of assets and liabilities over time under conditions of different degrees of uncertainty and risk. Finance can also be defined as the science of money management. A key point in finance is the time value of money, which states that purchasing power of one unit of currency can vary over time. Finance aims to price assets based on their risk level and their expected rate of return. Finance can be broken into three different sub-categories: public finance, corporate finance and personal finance.

Areas of finance

Wall Street, the center of American finance.

Wall Street, the center of American finance.

London Stock Exchange, global center of finance.

London Stock Exchange, global center of finance.

Personal finance

Questions in personal finance revolve around:

Structuring

Structuring, also known as smurfing in banking industry jargon, is the practice of executing financial transactions (such as the making of bank deposits) in a specific pattern calculated to avoid the creation of certain records and reports required by law, such as the United States' Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) and Internal Revenue Code section 6050I (relating to the requirement to file Form 8300).

Legal restrictions on structuring should not be confused with capital controls, which are statutory or regulatory limits on the money that one can take out of a nation, though they can have some of the same economic effects in some economies, as structuring controls effectively limit the flow of capital by magnitude and duration, and can apply equally to taking money out of a nation as well as putting money into its finance system.

Background

Structuring includes the act of parceling what would otherwise be a large financial transaction into a series of smaller transactions to avoid scrutiny by regulators or law enforcement. Structuring often appears in federal indictments related to money laundering, fraud, and other financial crimes.

Financial plan

In general usage, a financial plan is a comprehensive evaluation of an individual's current pay and future financial state by using current known variables to predict future income, asset values and withdrawal plans. This often includes a budget which organizes an individual's finances and sometimes includes a series of steps or specific goals for spending and saving in the future. This plan allocates future income to various types of expenses, such as rent or utilities, and also reserves some income for short-term and long-term savings. A financial plan is sometimes referred to as an investment plan, but in personal finance a financial plan can focus on other specific areas such as risk management, estates, college, or retirement.

Context of Business

In business, a financial plan can refer to the three primary financial statements (balance sheet, income statement, and cash flow statement) created within a business plan. Financial forecast or financial plan can also refer to an annual projection of income and expenses for a company, division or department. A financial plan can also be an estimation of cash needs and a decision on how to raise the cash, such as through borrowing or issuing additional shares in a company.

Investment banking

An investment bank is a financial institution that assists individuals, corporations, and governments in raising financial capital by underwriting or acting as the client's agent in the issuance of securities. An investment bank may also assist companies involved in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and provide ancillary services such as market making, trading of derivatives and equity securities, and FICC services (fixed income instruments, currencies, and commodities).

Unlike commercial banks and retail banks, investment banks do not take deposits. From the passage of Glass–Steagall Act in 1933 until its repeal in 1999 by the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act, the United States maintained a separation between investment banking and commercial banks. Other industrialized countries, including G7 countries, have historically not maintained such a separation. As part of the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (Dodd-Frank Act of 2010), the Volcker Rule asserts full institutional separation of investment banking services from commercial banking.