A W-2 form is a tax form required from employers that reports wages paid and taxes withheld to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), local state tax authorities and the Social Security Administration.

W-2 Form

A W-4 form is a standard IRS form an employee uses to report federal taxability status to an employer.

W-4 Form

The W-8 form is a standard IRS form that exempts non-U.S. citizens from specific federal income taxes.

W-8 Form

The W-9 form is a standard IRS form that certifies an individual's Social Security number and taxpayer identification number.

W-9 Form

A W-shaped recovery refers to two consecutive cycles of economic decline and growth that graphically resemble the letter "W."

W-Shaped Recovery

A wage assignment refers to a forced payment of a financial obligation via automatic withholding from an employee's pay.

Wage Assignment

A wage earner plan, subsequently known as Chapter 13, is a bankruptcy protection scheme that allows income earners to satisfy outstanding debts -- in whole or in part -- within a specific time frame.

Wage Earner Plan

Also called garnishment, a wage execution is a process under which money owed or paid to a borrower is given to a creditor instead.

Wage Execution

Wage expense is the total compensation a company pays its employees during a particular accounting period.

Wage Expense

A wage garnishment is an obligatory payment of a debt where a portion of an employee's paycheck is automatically withheld to pay the debt.

Wage Garnishment

Also called cost-push inflation, a wage-price spiral is an economic term that describes how prices increase when wages increase.

Wage-Price Spiral

Also called cost-push inflation or a wage-price spiral, wage-push inflation is an economic term that describes how prices increase when wages increase.

Wage-Push Inflation

The waiting period refers to the time period between a company filing a registration statement with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the SEC declaring that statement to be effective. This is also referred to as the "quiet period."

Waiting Period

A waiver is a party's voluntary renunciation of rights in a contractual arrangement.

Waiver

Under a waiver of demand, a payee assumes responsibility for a check or bank draft that he or she endorses.

Waiver of Demand

A waiver of exemption is a clause in a contract that allows a creditor to seize property that state laws may exempt from seizure.

Waiver of Exemption

A waiver of notice is an agreement that allows people to conduct certain legal procedures without giving formal notification that he or she is going to do so.

Waiver of Notice

A waiver of premium rider is language in an insurance policy that allows the insured to stop making premium payments if he or she becomes ill or disabled.

Waiver of Premium Rider

A waiver of subrogation prevents an insurer from seeking payments from third parties that cause losses to the person or business it is insuring.

Waiver of Subrogation

Wall Street is the name used to describe the place in New York City where much of the United States' financial industry is concentrated. The name "Wall Street" is also used frequently used to describe the financial services industry, generally.

Wall Street

In the finance world, a wall of worry is an increasing amount of negative information about a security or about the market.

Wall of Worry

Wallflower is slang for a stock that analysts and investors tend to neglect.

Wallflower

Wallpaper is slang for a security with minimal to no market value.

Wallpaper

The Walmart effect refers to the economic impact of a large discount retailer on a local market. Named after the large discount retailer, it is used to describe the crowding out and shuttering of smaller, local businesses that attempt to operate in the same market as a big box store.

Walmart Effect

Walras's law is the concept that a surplus in one market indicates the presence of a shortage in another.

Walras's Law

In a Walrasian market, buy and sell orders are grouped together and then executed at specific times, rather than executed one by one continuously.

Walrasian Market

War babies are securities issued by companies in the defense industry.

War Babies

A war bond is a bond issued to finance war.

War Bond

A war chest is the cash set aside to deal with unexpected changes in a business environment or to take advantage of a sudden opportunity.

War Chest

A war economy centers on producing goods and services that support war efforts.

War Economy

Warehouse financing occurs when a lender lends to a borrower who uses inventory as collateral.

Warehouse Financing

Warehouse lending is credit provided to a mortgage lender to fund mortgages until the lender sells them in the secondary market.

Warehouse Lending

A warehouse receipt is a piece of paper promising that a specific quantity and quality of a particular asset is in a given location.

Warehouse Receipt

Warehousing is the process of accumulating shares in a company for the purpose of eventually acquiring the firm.

Warehousing

A warm card is a bank card that allows the user to make one kind of transaction but not another.

Warm Card

A warning bulletin is a list of credit cards that are reported stolen, canceled or compromised in some way.

Warning Bulletin

Warrants are securities that give the holder the right, but not the obligation, to buy a certain number of securities (usually the issuer's common stock) at a certain price before a certain time. Warrants are not the same as call options or stock purchase rights.

Warrant

Warrant coverage is an agreement to provide warrants to a shareholder.

Warrant Coverage

A warrant premium is the percentage difference between the market price of a security and the price an investor pays for that security when buying and exercising a warrant.

Warrant Premium

A warranty is a guarantee, usually written, that a product or service works as expected.

Warranty

A warranty deed is a real estate document which states that the owner owns the purchased property free and clear of any outstanding mortgages, liens, or other types of encumbrances against it.

Warranty Deed

Commonly referred to as "The Oracle of Omaha" because of his Nebraska roots, Warren Buffett is widely regarded as the world's most prominent value investor.

Warren Buffett

A wash occurs when two actions cancel each other out (such as a gain and an equal loss), effectively creating a break-even situation.

Wash

A wash sale occurs when an investor sells a security at a loss but then purchases the same or a substantially similar security within 30 days of the sale.

Wash Sale

Wash trading occurs when an investor sells a security at a loss, then purchases the same or a substantially similar security within 30 days of the sale.

Wash Trading

A wash-out round is a round of financing that dilutes the original shareholders so much that their voting power is essentially "washed out."

Wash-Out Round

A wasting asset is a property or security that has a limited life and loses value over its life.

Wasting Asset

A wasting trust holds the assets of qualified plans when the qualified plans are frozen.

Wasting Trust

A watch list is a list of securities that regulators, brokerages, research firms, or other entities are interested in monitoring.

Watch List

A water damage clause is the section of an insurance contract that details whether and how much the insurer will pay the insured for damage caused by water.

Water Damage Clause

A water ETF is an exchange-traded fund that invests in water-related companies.

Water ETF

Water rights are the legal permissions to use water in a specific way.

Water Rights

Watered stock is stock that is issued at a price far higher than the value of the issuer's assets.

Watered Stock

A waterfall concept is an insurance strategy whereby a child or grandchild inherits a tax-exempt whole-life insurance policy.

Waterfall Concept

A waterfall payment is a repayment system by which senior lenders receive principal and interest payments from a borrower first, and subordinate lenders receive principal and interest payments after.

Waterfall Payment

In investing, a wave is a pattern found in stock prices, technology, consumer trends or other areas. In technical analysis, the term often refers to Elliot Wave Theory.

Wave

A weak currency is a currency that is going down in value.

Weak Currency

A weak dollar is used to describe the United States' currency decreasing in value relative to other currencies.

Weak Dollar

The random walk theory states that market and securities prices are random and not influenced by past events. The idea is also referred to as weak form efficiency or the weak form efficient-market hypothesis.

Weak Form Efficiency

In futures trading, weak hands are investors who do not intend to take delivery of the underlying asset. In currency trading, weak hands are investors who tend to follow traditional trading rules, thus making their trading predictable.

Weak Hands

Weak longs are investors who buy a stock (known as being "long"), but who will sell it at the first sign of a price decline.

Weak Longs

Weak shorts are investors who short sell a stock (known as being "short"), but who will buy it back at the first sign of a price increase.

Weak Shorts

A weak sister is a security, economy or operating unit that performs worse than all the others.

Weak Sister

In the business world, wealth is a measure of financial resources.

Wealth

Wealth management services are offered because individuals with a high net worth often have complicated financial situations.

Wealth Management

A wealth psychologist is a person who helps people cope with the emotional aspects of money.

Wealth Psychologist

A wealth tax is based on a person's net worth or the value of his or her assets.

Wealth Tax

A wedding warrant is a bond provision that requires the holder of a bond to relinquish the bond to the issuer if the holder purchases another bond with similar features from the same company.

Wedding Warrant

The weekend effect is a theory that stock prices rise on Monday and fall on Friday.

Weekend Effect

Weighted refers to the mathematical practice of adjusting the components of an index to reflect the importance of certain characteristics.

Weighted

Weighted average refers to the mathematical practice of adjusting the components of an average to reflect the importance of certain characteristics.

Weighted Average

In investing terms, WACC shows the average rate that companies pay to finance their overall operations. WACC is calculated by incorporating equity investments from the sale of stock, as well as any operational debt they incur (with respect to the firm’s enterprise value).

Weighted Average Cost of Capital (WACC)

Weighted Average Market Capitalization refers to a stock market index in which larger companies (i.e. with higher market capitalization) have more influence on the index's performance.

Weighted Average Market Capitalization

Weighted average maturity or WAM is the weighted average amount of time until the securities in a portfolio mature.

Weighted Average Maturity (WAM)

A Wells Notice is a letter from a regulator such as the Securities and Exchange Commission that warns a financial institution or financial professional that the SEC is beginning an investigation into the institution's or professional's activities.

Wells Notice

A wet loan is a mortgage in which the borrower gets the funding before all the paperwork is done.

Wet Loan

A trader is said to be "whipsawed" when the price of a security suddenly moves in the opposite direction of a trade that he just placed.

Whipsaw

A whisper number is an unofficial, unpublished earnings per share (EPS) forecast for a public company. It is not the same as a consensus estimate.

Whisper Number

A white knight is a company that acquires another company that is trying to avoid acquisition by a third party.

White Knight

Whole life insurance is a type of permanent life insurance policy that provides both a death benefit and a cash value accumulation provision.

Whole Life Insurance

A wholly owned subsidiary is a subsidiary company whose parent company owns 100% of the company's outstanding common stock.

Wholly Owned Subsidiary

A wide economic moat is a significant competitive advantage that is extremely difficult to copy or emulate, thereby creating a barrier to entry for competing firms.

Wide Economic Moat

Widow and orphan stocks are low-risk securities that pay high dividends.

Widow and Orphan Stock

Wildcat drilling is the process of looking for oil and natural gas wells in non-typical areas.

Wildcat Drilling

A will is a legal document that indicates how a person wants his or her estate (money and property) to be distributed after death. Wills must expressly state to whom the will belongs and be signed, dated and include the signatures of at least two witnesses. A will also may describe any wishes for funeral and burial arrangements and may designate guardians for minor children.

Will

Often combined with stochastics to detect overbought and oversold conditions, Williams %R -- or %R for short -- is a momentum indicator developed by Larry Williams.

Williams %R

The Wilshire 5000 Index is considered the "total market index." Designed to track the value of the entire stock market, the index was started in 1974 by Wilshire Associates soon after computers made the daily computation of such a large index possible.

Wilshire 5000 Index

Window dressing is a term that describes the act of making a company's performance, particularly its financial statements, look attractive.

Window Dressing

In a brokerage firm, a wire room receives customer orders from brokers, sends the orders to the exchanges, and sends back notices of execution.

Wire Room

A wire transfer is a method of transferring money electronically between two people or institutions.

Wire Transfer

The witching hour is the last hour of the trading day.

Witching Hour

A withdrawal penalty occurs when a depositor or investor withdraws funds from an account before an agreed-upon withdrawal date for disallowed purposes or in a disallowed manner.

Withdrawal Penalty

A withholding allowance reduces the amount of income tax an employer withholds from an employee's paycheck.

Withholding Allowance

Discover how withholding taxes work – and what they mean for your upcoming tax refund.

Withholding Tax

Work in process refers to items in a manufacturing plant that are in the stages between raw materials and finished goods (or inventory). In-process goods are expected to be finished and moved into inventory soon, but they aren’t quite complete yet.

Work in Process (WIP)

Working capital is money that’s available to a company for its day-to-day operations. Simply put, working capital indicates a company's operating liquidity and efficiency.

Working Capital

A working capital loan is a loan used by companies to cover day-to-day operational expenses.

Working Capital Loan

A company's working ratio measures its ability to cover its annual expenses.

Working Ratio

The World Bank is an international financial institution dedicated to reducing poverty around the world through capital investment and the facilitation of trade.

World Bank

The World Trade Organization (WTO) establishes rules of trade among its member nations. To this end, the WTO also handles trade disputes, monitors trade policies, provides technical assistance for developing countries and cooperates with other international trade organizations.

World Trade Organization (WTO)

A write-down is the accounting term used to describe a reduction in the book value of an asset due to economic or fundamental changes in the asset. A write-down is the opposite of a write-up.

Definitions starting with "W"

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