incurred

Intermediate đź’° Finance / Accounting

Definition

Corporate-speak for 'we spent money' or 'we're now responsible for something unfortunate.' It's the passive-aggressive accounting term for when costs, debts, or liabilities show up uninvited on your balance sheet. The word makes financial disasters sound inevitable and sophisticated, as if you didn't just make a questionable decision.

Example Usage

We incurred significant losses this quarter, which is a fancy way of saying we lit money on fire and called it a growth strategy.

Source: Accounting and financial terminology

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trusts

Legal arrangements where one party holds property or assets for the benefit of another, creating a three-way relationship between the person who created it, the trustee managing it, and the beneficiary enjoying it. It's how wealthy families keep money in the family while minimizing taxes and preventing irresponsible heirs from blowing their inheritance on crypto. Also refers to the confidence you probably shouldn't have in said arrangements.

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full faith and credit

A government's unconditional guarantee to honor debt obligations using its taxing power, theoretically the safest backing possible. 'We'll tax citizens into oblivion before we default' in more dignified language.

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Paying employees with equity instead of cash, diluting shareholders while claiming the expense is somehow not real money. Tech companies love it because it preserves cash while making EBITDA look artificially high.

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assets

Anything you own that's worth actual money or could theoretically be converted into money, from real estate to that dusty server in the corner. In business, it's the good side of your balance sheet that makes you look solvent. In intelligence work, it refers to human sources—actual people feeding you information—which is a wildly different but equally valuable definition.

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trial balance

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liabilities

Everything a business owes to others—debts, obligations, and promises to pay that hang over the company like a financial sword of Damocles. It's the right side of the balance sheet that accountants love to balance against assets, creating the fundamental equation of accounting. Can also mean that person on your team who's more problem than solution.

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