Definition

The price tag of existence—what you sacrifice financially to acquire something, whether it's measured in dollars, tears, or regret. The monetary burden of turning wants into haves.

Example Usage

The cost of cloud infrastructure scaled unexpectedly as the startup added users.

Source: Universal economic terminology

Related Terms

Advanced

Margin Call

The terrifying phone call from your broker informing you that your borrowed-money bets have gone south and you need to cough up more cash immediately. It's the financial equivalent of your landlord and your bookie showing up at the same time demanding payment.

💰 Finance / Accounting
Beginner

insure

The financial equivalent of betting against your own bad luck. You pay a company money regularly, they promise to pay you back a lot more if something awful happens—unless they can prove it's not technically their problem.

💰 Finance / Accounting
Intermediate

cherry picking

Selectively choosing favorable data points while ignoring unfavorable ones, or choosing which trades to allocate to which accounts after seeing results. It's the art of making anything look good through strategic omission.

💰 Finance / Accounting
Beginner

bookkeeping

The meticulous art of recording every financial transaction in a systematic way, traditionally done by people who enjoy spreadsheets more than human interaction. It's the foundation of accounting, involving ledgers, journals, and an obsessive attention to making sure debits equal credits. The only profession where 'excitement' means finding a balanced account.

💰 Finance / Accounting
Intermediate

unsecured

A loan or obligation with no collateral backing it up—basically a financial relationship built entirely on trust and optimism. It's like lending money to your friend with only a pinky promise as insurance.

💰 Finance / Accounting
Intermediate

crypto

Short for cryptocurrency, the digital money that exists entirely in the cloud and whose value fluctuates more wildly than your mood on a Monday morning. It's either the future of finance or the world's most elaborate Ponzi scheme, depending on whether you bought Bitcoin at $100 or $60,000. Also refers to cryptography, the actual useful technology that crypto enthusiasts sometimes remember exists.

💰 Finance / Accounting

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See “cost” in Corporate Speak, Gen-Z Slang, Pirate Speak, and more.

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Intermediate

venture debt

Loans provided to venture-backed startups, typically secured by assets or future funding rounds. It's called 'non-diluti...