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Glossary

Leverage

Using something you do not own - money, people, code or audience - to multiply your output.

Financial leverage is borrowed money: a 20% deposit lets you control a whole property, so a 5% price rise becomes a 25% return on your cash. It magnifies losses on exactly the same terms.

The more interesting kinds are labour, code and media. Code and content are permissionless leverage - they work while you sleep and cost nothing to copy - which is why so much modern wealth comes from software and audiences rather than from borrowing.

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