Business Glossary
Plain-English definitions of business, finance, legal, and crypto terms — from Business Dog. No jargon, no gatekeeping, occasional jokes.
A
- Angel InvestorA wealthy individual who invests their own money into early-stage businesses.
B
- B2BBusiness-to-Business — selling products or services to other businesses.
- B2CBusiness-to-Consumer — selling directly to individual people.
- Bear MarketA period when prices are falling and pessimism dominates.
- BootstrappingBuilding a business using your own money and its own revenue, without outside investors.
- Break-Even PointThe point where total revenue equals total costs — no profit, no loss.
- Bull MarketA period when prices are rising and optimism is high.
- Burn RateHow fast a business spends its cash, usually measured per month.
- BusinessAn organization or activity that provides goods or services in exchange for money.
- Business Bank AccountA dedicated bank account for your business, kept strictly separate from personal money.
- Business Email CompromiseBEC — a scam where fraudsters impersonate a trusted party by email to redirect a real payment.
- Business ModelThe specific way a business makes money.
C
- Cash FlowThe actual money moving in and out of a business over time.
- Customer Acquisition CostCAC — how much it costs, on average, to get one new paying customer.
D
- Dark PatternA user-interface trick designed to nudge you into choices you didn't mean to make.
- DEXA decentralized exchange — trade crypto peer-to-peer with no company in the middle.
- DividendA share of a company's profits paid out to shareholders.
- Due DiligenceThe research you do before making a deal, investment, or big business decision.
E
G
- Gross MarginThe percentage of revenue left after the direct cost of what you sold.
I
- IPOInitial Public Offering — when a private company first sells shares to the public.
L
M
- Market CapThe total value of all a company's shares or a token's supply — price times quantity.
- MemecoinA cryptocurrency built around a meme, community, or joke rather than a technical use case.
- Minimum Viable ProductMVP — the simplest version of a product you can launch to start learning from real customers.
- MLMMulti-level marketing — selling products through a network of distributors who also recruit.
- Money MuleA person who moves stolen or laundered money for criminals — often without realizing it's a crime.
O
- OverheadThe ongoing costs of running a business that aren't tied to a specific sale.
P
- Ponzi SchemeA fraud that pays existing investors with new investors' money instead of real profit.
- ProfitWhat's left after you subtract all expenses from revenue — the 'bottom line.'
- Pyramid SchemeAn illegal model where money comes from recruiting others, not selling real products.
R
- RevenueThe total money a business takes in before any expenses — the 'top line.'
- Revenue vs ProfitRevenue is money in; profit is what's left after expenses. Confusing them kills businesses.
- ROIReturn on Investment — how much you gained relative to what you put in.
- Rug PullA crypto scam where creators abandon a project and run off with investors' money.
- RunwayHow long a business can survive on its current cash before running out.
S
- S-CorpA tax election that can save established businesses money on self-employment taxes.
- Self-Employment TaxThe ~15.3% tax self-employed people pay to cover both halves of Social Security and Medicare.
- Shell CompanyA business that exists on paper with no real operations — legal, but a scammer favorite.
- SolanaA fast, low-cost blockchain popular for tokens, NFTs, and memecoins.
- Sole ProprietorshipThe simplest business structure: you and the business are legally the same person.
- StockA share of ownership in a company.
V
- ValuationWhat a business is estimated to be worth, often set during fundraising.
- Venture CapitalInvestment money given to high-growth startups in exchange for equity (ownership).
W
- Wash TradingFaking trading volume by buying and selling to yourself to make an asset look popular.