The financial industry originated in the Babylonian temple in 2000 BC and the Greek temple in the 6th century BC. From the 5th century BC to the 3rd century BC, money dealers and commercial institutions like banks appeared in Athens and Rome.
In Europe, modern banks developed from currency exchange and goldsmith. The earliest bank appeared in Venice, Italy (1580). 1694, Britain established the first joint-stock bank-the Bank of England, which established the most basic organizational form for the development of modern financial industry. Since then, the financial industry in capitalist countries has developed rapidly, which has greatly promoted the accumulation of capital and the concentration of production.
After a long historical evolution, the modern financial industry has gradually developed into a variety of financial institutions from a relatively single form in ancient society. In the modern financial industry, all kinds of banks occupy a dominant position.
Second, financing refers to special industries engaged in financial commodity trading, including banking, insurance, trust, securities and leasing.
Finance is a discipline that studies value judgments and laws. It mainly includes two fields: traditional financial theory and evolutionary financial theory.
Mankind has entered the financial age and society. So finance is everywhere, forming a huge system. The scope, branches and contents of finance are very extensive, such as currency, securities, banking, insurance, capital market, derivative securities, investment and wealth management, various funds (private placement and public offering), balance of payments, financial management, trade finance, real estate finance, foreign exchange management, risk management and so on.
The trend of interdisciplinary and innovative development in the financial field is very obvious, and many striking new frontier disciplines have emerged. For example, evolutionary finance is a frontier science between biology and finance, while evolutionary securities is a frontier discipline between biology and securities.
Third, the characteristics of finance.
1.？ The financial industry has the characteristics of index, monopoly, high risk, interest dependence and high debt management.