Account

An account happens when you deposit money (legally) into a registered investment account at a known financial institution. An account comes in many flavors, the most sweetly vanilla of which are your basic and checking and savings accounts at a bank like Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Bank of Uzbekistan. A spicier flavor of an account type is a margin account, usually held in the form of stocks deposited into a stock broker's margin account.

Why is margin good? (And it has nothing to do with butter.) It's good because you can borrow in most systems up to 50% of the value of the securities you have in that account. Since the various terrorist acts of modern times, the level of inspection, disclosure, and legal strictures has increased dramatically, so if you have an actual registered-for-realz account, expect that you are sending loving letters to the NSA every time you trade.