agency

In context of general equities, buying or selling for the account and risk of a customer. Generally, an agent, or broker, acts as intermediary between buyer and seller, taking no financial risk personally or as a firm, and charging a commission for the service. The broker represents a customer buyer/seller to a customer seller/buyer and does not act as principal for the firm's own trading account. Antithesis of principal. Bloomberg Financial Dictionary

See: dealer. Bloomberg Financial Dictionary

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agency a‧gen‧cy [ˈeɪdʒnsi] noun agencies _PLURALFORM [countable] ORGANIZATIONS

1. a government department with a particular responsibility:

• the Atomic Energy Agency

• the Environmental Protection Agency

ˈaid ˌagency ORGANIZATIONS

a government or private organization which helps people who are suffering from war, hunger etc by providing them with doctors, food, medicine, money etc:

• international aid agencies, such as UNICEF

2. COMMERCE a business that provides a particular service or provides information about other businesses and their products:

• Association Marketing Inc, an insurance agency and brokerage company

ˈadvertising ˌagency also ˈad ˌagency MARKETING ORGANIZATIONS

a business that gives advice to companies about how they should advertise their products, and produces advertisements for them:

• He is planning director at the advertising agency J. Walter Thompson.

colˈlection ˌagency COMMERCE ORGANIZATIONS

a business that buys debts from other businesses for a reduced amount and obtains payment of them

comˈmercial ˌagency COMMERCE ORGANIZATIONS

1. an organization offering information on the finances of a company or person, especially information on whether or not they can be expected to pay for something you provide them with; = CREDIT AGENCY AmE

2. any kind of profit-making agency

ˈcredit ˌagency FINANCE ORGANIZATIONS

an organization that gives information about the financial strength of companies and governments to financial institutions and suppliers, so that they can decide whether to lend money or allow goods to be bought on credit:

• The credit agency lowered the rating of California's public debt to double-A from the top rank of triple-A.

emˈployment ˌagency also emˈployment ˌbureau HUMAN RESOURCES ORGANIZATIONS

a business that works for organizations to find people for jobs when the organizations need them; = RECRUITMENT AGENCY:

• There are many employment agencies who deal with advertising personnel.

esˈtate ˌagency PROPERTY ORGANIZATIONS

a real estate agency

ˈrating ˌagency also ratings agency

FINANCE ORGANIZATIONS an independent organization that calculates the risk of investing in or lending to a company and gives it a rating based on this. Examples of rating agencies are Moody's and Standard & Poors:

• The ratings agency lowered the fund's rating to triple-B-plus from single-A-minus.

ˈreal estate ˌagency PROPERTY ORGANIZATIONS

a company that sells houses or land for other people; = estate agency Bre

reˈcruitment ˌagency also reˈcruitment ˌfirm HUMAN RESOURCES ORGANIZATIONS

a business that works for organizations to find people for jobs when the organizations need them; = EMPLOYMENT AGENCY

ˈstaff ˌagency also employment agency HUMAN RESOURCES ORGANIZATIONS

a company whose business is to find new employees for other companies; = EMPLOYMENT AGENCY

ˈtravel ˌagency TRAVEL

a company that makes travel arrangements for people, for example by arranging their flights, hotels etc

3. MARKETING ORGANIZATIONS a business that represents a company in a particular area and sells its products

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agency UK US /ˈeɪdʒ^ənsi/ noun [C] (plural agencies)

► COMMERCE a business that provides a service to other people or organizations: »

Background checks may be done in-house or by an outside agency.

»

She now runs an agency which last year catered for more than 17,000 travellers.

► GOVERNMENT a government department that is responsible for a particular activity: »

Scottish Natural Heritage, the conservation agency, has finally managed to get approval for the project.

security/intelligence/immigration, etc. agency »

In a lengthy response to the report, the immigration agency stated that it will follow the recommendations.

»

a government/federal/state agency

→ See also AD AGENCY(Cf. ↑ad agency), ADVERTISING AGENCY(Cf. ↑advertising agency), AID AGENCY(Cf. ↑aid agency), COLLECTION AGENCY(Cf. ↑collection agency), COMMERCIAL AGENCY(Cf. ↑commercial agency), EMPLOYMENT AGENCY(Cf. ↑employment agency), ESTATE AGENCY(Cf. ↑estate agency), CREDIT RATING AGENCY(Cf. ↑credit rating agency), REAL ESTATE AGENCY(Cf. ↑real estate agency), RECRUITMENT AGENCY(Cf. ↑recruitment agency), STAFF AGENCY(Cf. ↑staff agency), TRAVEL AGENCY(Cf. ↑travel agency)