As other sectors have their registers, the financial industry has usages and terms peculiar to it. One of such is ‘collateral’, which is a matter that banks don’t joke with.
It refers to ‘something pledged as security for repayment of a loan, to be forfeited in the event of default’. As popular as the term is, it has a characteristic that many of us do not respect: it is an uncountable noun. As a result, pluralising it will normally be wrong. Consider these sentences:
- The company proposed five cars as collaterals. (Wrong)
- The company proposed five cars as collateral. (Correct)
- The collaterals for the loan are two shopping malls. (Wrong)
- The collateral for the loan are two shopping malls. (Correct)
- Note that ‘collateral’ does also not require the indefinite article:
- A collateral will be needed according to the manager. (Wrong)
- Collateral will be needed according to the manager. (Correct)
- Exception: In the medical field where ‘collateral’ refers to a small blood vessel, it can be pluralised:
- The doctor was able to trace two collaterals said to have been infected.
Savings
Compared to ‘collateral’, savings is usually plural when referring to the money you keep in an account in a bank. You should thus watch this and ensure you do not drop the ‘s’ that ends it whether in writing or pronunciation:
The man is worried because he currently has no saving. (Wrong)
The man is worried because he currently has no savings. (Correct)
I want to open a saving account at the new bank. (Wrong)
I want to open a savings account. (Correct)
The hyphen in hard-off
When someone is not in a palatable financial situation he can be said to be hard-off. Note the hyphen between the two words. This is unlike what we have in ‘It does not add up’ (not make sense) or ‘He is hard up’ (not have enough of something important or valuable).
Lend or borrow?
If I want to take money from someone with the intention to pay them back, I am borrowing the money. This means that the fellow is lending me the cash. The person taken it is the borrower, the one giving it out is the lender:
Chief Ogbede borrowed me N500,000 last year. (Wrong)
Chief Ogbede lent me N500,000 last year. (Correct)
I want to lend more money from him. (Wrong)
I want to borrow more money from him. (Correct)
Instalmental error
You should remember that, during a past lesson, we highlighted the error in saying someone pays a credit back instalmentally. The standard expression is pay in instalments or by instalments:
The car dealer is a nice man. He allowed me to pay instalmentally. (Wrong)
The car dealer is a nice man. He allowed me to pay in instalments. (Correct)
If the seller does not want you to pay by/in instalments, then we have a matter of ‘one-off payment’. Note the hyphen in the expression too, because the two words have been combined to form an adjective qualifying ‘payment’.
Invest in
Lastly, the correct preposition with invest is ‘in’. You invest in a business or an idea:
My plan is to invest on oil and gas. (Wrong)
My plan is to invest in oil and gas. (Correct)
My plan is to invest into oil and gas. (Wrong)
My plan is to invest in oil and gas. (Correct).
