A car (computer) that has been launched lately.
Text 2
Какие преимущества предлагает Интернет в сфере банковских услуг? Прочитайте текст и найдите слова, означающие:
a sum of money to be paid in case of accident (loss, etc.), money in one's account, money to be paid for lighting (heating in your house), a manner or way of doing smth., allow to.
Banking on a Web Lifestyle
According to Bill Gates, a well-known winner of MN Golden Certificate from Microsoft, within 5—8 years, and possibly much earlier, many people will manage their finances via the Internet. Each bank will put up Web pages that present its products in an easy-to-use fashion, making it simple for customers to manage money quite well electronically.
If you are a customer, your funds will move automatically to meet your needs. You will easily get answers to questions such as: Am I saving enough? Have I gathered all the information I need to file a tax return (налоговая декларация)? Am I keeping to my budget? How does this month's electric bill compare to the bill for the same month last year?
These changes won't come at the expense of the banking industry. On the contrary, the Web will let companies offer services that meet individual needs, which is an essential advantage.
Productivity improvements tend to produce many more winners than losers. Life gets better when people discover a fundamen-
tally better way to do something important. That is why the Web is unlikely to dehumanize banking or anything else.
The Web will offer banks great opportunities, especially as their services expand to include insurance, advice and a broad range of investments. Some banks will offer to manage your assets (имущество, активы баланса) and provide you with credit. If your checking account balance (баланс счета) gets too high, the bank will offer to move funds into investments that have higher yields (процентный доход).
Banks will advise you to pay down credit-card balances or other loans (заем, ссуда), and let you do it with a click. They will know that if they do not give you this kind of advice and convenience, you are likely to take your business elsewhere.
The Internet is a tool of communication, a place for people as well as for extensive information.
Упражнение 1. Дайте русские эквиваленты выделенным словам. Переведите предложения. Запомните ключевые слова и словосочетания.
1. Businessmen can lend (давать взаймы) and borrow (брать взаймы) money.
2. The money to be borrowed from the bank is called a loan.
3. Most companies borrow money to finance (i.e., to pay for) investments (e.g., equipment they buy in order to do business).
4. If you borrow money from the bank you must pay interest. Interest rate is per cent (процентная ставка) you should pay back.
5. Businesses have to make a profit, not to make a loss.
6. To make a profit means to earn or receive more money than you spend.
7. If a company does not make a profit or a loss, it breaks even (рентабельна, безубыточна).
8. The money a company receives for its products is called the turnover.
9. The money spent is called the expenditure.
10. A company spends money on raw materials, labour (workers, employees, staff) and overheads (e.g., rent for buildings, electricity, telephone, etc.)
11. In order to grow or expand and prosper (do well, be successful) the companies need low inflation or rate of inflation (which means the continuous increase in the price of products), low interest rates, economic and political stability, a healthy economy, not an economy in recession, and tax cuts as well. Recession is a pe-
riod of reduced and slow business activity. Tax is a sum of money to be paid by citizens (according to income, for example) to the government for public purposes.
12. A trend is a change or movement of prices, profits, sales,
etc. To describe a trend we can use the following expressions:
The government will raise taxes.
Taxes will rise (increase, go up) by 2 % (or to 28 %).
There will be a sharp rise in inflation.
Taxes will fall (go down, decrease) slowly.
There will be a slow fall (decrease) in taxes.
Prices are up by 5 %; profits are down by $2 million.
Inflation will probably remain stable at around 3 %.
13. Expenditure is spending or using money, for example, gov
ernment expenditure.
Упражнение 2. Замените выделенные слова и словосочетания близким по значению словом или словосочетанием.
1. Our company is doing well now. 2. Sales have increased dramatically. 3. This came after a dramatic fall last year. 4. Profits have risen considerably. 5. Our turnover has gone up this year. 6. The company is growing very quickly. 7. We expect sales to increase for about two years. 8. Then they will fall slightly. 9. It is necessary to spend more money on R&D (Research and Development).
Упражнение 3. Заполните пропуски, образуя составные слова или общеизвестные фразы.
| healthy... | ... and loss | credit... |
| ... stability | interest... | ... return |
| break... | ... materials | account... |
| economy in... | tax... | productivity |
| turn... | over... |
Упражнение 4. Составьте возможные словосочетания глаголов из колонки А и существительных из колонки В.
А В
1. finance a. money on
2. offer b. services
3. provide with с a profit / loss
4. gather d. needs
5. make e. investments
6. meet f. information
7. spend g. opportunity
8. expand h. interest
9. lend/borrow i. credit 10. pay j. money
Упражнение 5. Заполните таблицу на словообразование.
| Verb | Noun | Adjective |
| educate | • • • | • • • |
| ... | • • • | reducible |
| differ | expenditure • • • | • • • • • • |
| • • • | payment comparison | • • • comparable |
| • • • | • • • | expensive |
Упражнение 6. А. Прочитайте текст и постарайтесь догадаться о значении следующих слов и словосочетаний: unit of account, value, grains, print, consider, cease, cash, withdraw, bank account.
Money as a Unit of Account
The most difficult aspect of money to understand is its function as a unit of account. Money is difficult to define, because the value of anything changes with time and circumstances.
Sir Isaac Newton defined the pound sterling (£) in 1717 as 113 grains of pure gold. By the end of the nineteenth century the gold standard had spread around most of the trading world, with the result that there was a single world money. It was called by different names in different countries, but all these supposedly different currencies were interconnected through their particular definition in terms of a quantity of gold.
The end of the gold standard began with the introduction of the agreement in 1946. This fixed the value of all world currencies relative to the US dollar, which in turn was fixed to a specific value of gold (US $ 0.35/oz.) However, in 1971 the US government finally refused to exchange US dollar for gold, and other countries soon followed. Governments printed as much paper money or coinage as they wanted, and the more that was printed, the less each unit of currency was worth.
The great advantage of the nineteenth-century gold standard was not just that it defined the unit of account, but that it operated throughout almost the entire world. A price in England was the same as a price in Australia or any other country.
Today we can determine price differences between countries by considering the exchange rate of the day.
The great advantage of having a single stable world money is that such money has very high information content. It tells people where to invest their time, energy and capital, all around the world, with much greater accuracy and predictability than would otherwise be possible.
Nowadays many specialists believe that within the next decade money, as we know it will probably cease to exist in technologically advanced countries. The familiar coins and notes will soon be replaced entirely by plastic money — plastic cards of various kinds. And the shops of the future will be linked directly to the network of banking computers. The shop assistant will simply key in your bank account code number and the amount you have spent, and thank you politely.
Banks have invested huge amounts of money in new technology. Credit cards are issued by credit card companies such as Visa and MasterCard. These companies work closely with all the major banks. A credit card enables you to pay for goods or services immediately without cash or cheque. You are given free credit for an agreed period. At the end of this period you are charged high interest. Every credit card holder is given a credit limit.
Most banks provide their customers with banker's cards. Using PIN (personal identification number) you can use this card to withdraw cash from the ATMs (Automated Teller Machines).
Some banks have already introduced «first generation» smart cards. A smart card contains a computer «chip». It can do all the things other cards can do but it can also store and display each transaction. In the near future you may be using these cards for «home shopping», satellite TV, telephone charges, and as passports and identity cards.
В. Подберите к каждому слову и словосочетанию из колонки А соответствующее ему по значению из колонки В.
А В
1. unit of account a. take into account
2. bank account b. take out money from the bank
3. value с money in coin or notes
4. grains' d. keeping one's money at a bank
