If you’re scared of money, you suffer from chematophobia, from the Greek roots chemeta meaning alloying of metals and phobia meaning to be in dread of. There’s no known cure.

Fungibles aren’t a type of mushroom—they’re things that are completely interchangeable with other things like themselves because each has the same exact value. Some examples? Shares of a stock, dollar bills, and options contracts on the same underlying item.

Using the salami technique, computer criminals steal money from your account a little at a time. The slice may be as small as a fraction of a penny or as big a bite as 30 cents. You’ll probably never notice.

Though the concept of banking dates back to ancient Mesopotamia, the world’s first public bank didn’t open until 1401, in Barcelona, Spain.

"If you buy things you don’t need, you are stealing from yourself." —Czechoslovakian proverb

A pignus isn’t a little pig. It’s a pledge, or collateral held as security for a debt.

Dutch auctions don’t just take place in the Netherlands. The term refers to any auction where an item’s price is gradually lowered until the item is sold. The US Treasury uses Dutch auctions to sell its bills, notes, and bonds.

"Education costs money, but then so does ignorance." —Sir Claus Moser, English statistician and educator

The earliest known examples of writing are not poems, philosophy, or love letters, but Mesopotamian inventories of livestock and farming equipment dating from the late fourth millennium BC. In fact, many historians believe that writing was invented as a form of record keeping.

The Eiffel Tower, which cost about 7.8 million gold francs to build, was unveiled at the Paris World’s Fair in 1889. The wroughtiron structure, then the tallest in the world, commemorated the French Revolution.

Gold and silver are measured in pennyweights—with a pennyweight the silver equivalent of 24 grains of wheat or barley. Twenty pennyweights equal an ounce.

The currency of Guatemala, the quetzal, is named for a gorgeous Central American bird with golden-green plumage. The male has a dramatic long tail.

Import and property taxes were old hat even in the ancient world, but Julius Caesar may have introduced the world’s first general sales tax—of 1%—in the first century BC. Unfortunately, it caught on.

Flip a penny and there’s a 50/50 chance that it will be heads up or tails up, right? Technically, that’s not the case. The heads side weighs slightly more than the tails side and so is roughly 0.5% more likely to land on the bottom. That makes "tails" a slightly better bet.

Defeased bonds are debts that are repaid before the date when repayment is due. While you might lose some expected interest on a defeased bond, the issuer may pay you a premium—or more than the face value.

"A good debt is not as good as no debt." —Chinese proverb

When a bond’s rating is cut because a ratings company is concerned about the issuer’s economic health, the bond often drops in value. Traders call it a fallen angel—and a climb back to grace is never easy.

Underwriting means assuming the risk of providing insurance. The term comes from an old maritime practice: When investors in a trading venture signed their names below the contract terms, they also wrote the amount of risk they were willing to take.

Keiretsu isn’t a martial art. It’s the Japanese term for a business conglomerate of overlapping industries in which each participant owns a part of the others. For example, major players in the computer business—hardware and software manufacturers, technology firms, and banks—might form a keiretsu.

Electronic stock tickers report information as fast as the human eye can read it: 900 words a minute.

Zhao Danyang, a Chinese investment fund manager, paid US$2.1 million dollars in the 6th annual eBay charity auction raising money for the Glide Foundation. What he won was a lunch with Warren Buffett at a mutually convenient time.

"To give away money is an easy matter and in any man’s power. But to decide to whom and how to give it, and how large, and when, and for what purpose and how, is neither in every man’s power nor an easy matter." —Aristotle, Greek philosopher

On June 30, 1987, the C$1 loonie went into circulation in Canada. The bronze coin with its distinctive image of the graceful bird was a total success. It helped that the government took all C$1 bills out of circulation.

In 1618, a trader who paid £91,041 for 3,000 tons of Indian spices could sell them for £789,168—an 800% profit.

"He who does kind deeds becomes rich." —Hindu proverb

England’s first income tax was introduced by Prime Minister William Pitt in 1798 to pay for the war against Napoleon. Dubbed a temporary measure, it’s been collected in all but 27 of the years since.

"I’ve been rich and I’ve been poor. Believe me, rich is better." —Mae West, US actress

In 1946, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., donated US$8.5 million to the United Nations, enabling the new organization to purchase the 18-acre site along the East River in New York City that became its permanent home.

A decamillionaire isn’t hurting for cash. He or she has investable assets of US$10 million or more.

Barings Bank, founded in 1762, was the oldest merchant bank in London when it collapsed in 1995 after rogue trader Nick Leeson lost £827 million speculating on futures contracts. Among other ventures, it had helped the US finance the Louisiana Purchase in 1804.

Martin Luther King, Jr., was the youngest man ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize. In his acceptance speech in 1964, he pledged his US$54,123 in prize money to continuing the struggle for civil rights.

Winemakers choose screwcaps over traditional cork closures for many reasons, but the most obvious is price. A good cork can cost as much as US$1.50 per bottle while screwcaps are 1/10th the price—about 15 cents.

If volatility doesn’t bother you, try a yo-yo stock. Its share price follows a recurring pattern of sudden drops and rapid rebounds that brings to mind the most basic of yo-yo tricks, the gravity pull.

"An economist is a man who states the obvious in terms of the incomprehensible." —Alfred A. Knopf, US publisher

The Cullinan diamond—at 3,106 carats the largest gem-quality diamond ever found—was discovered on January 26, 1905, in Pretoria, South Africa. It was cut into 105 polished diamonds, including the 530 carat Star of Africa, whose estimated value is US$400 million.

Bottom fishers are investors who troll for stocks that have dropped significantly in price, hooking them before they’re back in the swim.

9th century Irishmen who refused to pay Danegeld, or tribute, to the powerful Danish Vikings had their noses slit open—the origin of the phrase "to pay through the nose."

When you go to South Africa, you spend rands, and each one is equal to 100 cents. Rand comes from a South African Dutch term that means shield.