Crib sheets

The atlas is a reference you read on a screen. These are the other thing a reference is for: one page per asset class, dense enough to be useful and short enough to print, fold and take into a room where this site is not open.

Not one line of them is written. The shelf comes from the product pages, the difficulty marks from the same table the atlas uses, the drivers and the calendar from the same place the category pages read, and the failure-mode counts from the same profiles each product prints. A crib sheet is the format people trust without re-checking, so the one thing it must never be is a summary that has quietly drifted from what it summarises. There is no second copy to drift.

EquitiesCash EquitiesDirect ownership instruments — shares and the funds that wrap them. The simplest claim on a company's future.Open the sheet →Eq. DerivativesEquity DerivativesContracts whose value derives from stocks and indices — options, swaps and structured payoffs on equity risk.Open the sheet →Fixed IncomeFixed IncomeDebt instruments that pay interest and return principal — from government bonds to securitised credit.Open the sheet →RatesRates DerivativesThe largest derivatives market on earth: instruments that transfer interest-rate risk between counterparties.Open the sheet →CreditCredit DerivativesInstruments that isolate and transfer default risk — insurance-like payoffs on whether a borrower survives.Open the sheet →FXForeign ExchangeThe deepest market in the world: exchanging one currency for another, today or at a date in the future.Open the sheet →FX DerivativesFX DerivativesOptionality on currency pairs — vanilla calls and puts, barriers and digitals on exchange rates.Open the sheet →Money MarketsMoney MarketsShort-term funding instruments — where banks, corporates and governments borrow for days to a year.Open the sheet →CommoditiesCommoditiesRaw materials as an asset class — energy, metals and agriculture, traded mostly through futures.Open the sheet →AlternativesAlternatives & Private MarketsBeyond public markets: private equity, venture, private credit, hedge funds and insurance-linked securities.Open the sheet →DigitalDigital AssetsCryptoassets and their derivatives — spot coins, perpetual futures and exchange-traded wrappers.Open the sheet →

How to use one

Print it. The site's navigation, footer and page furniture are dropped from the printed version; what is left is the sheet.
Read the shelf first. It is ordered by how much each instrument assumes, so the top of each class is the part that needs nothing beyond everyday words.
The failure-mode table is not a rating. It counts which of five things decides the outcome across the class. There is deliberately no total, and a market where one mode decides nearly everything is not riskier than one where three share the work — it is differently shaped.

Information and education only. Every line on every sheet is derived from pages that explain mechanisms in general terms using simplified models. Nothing on them is advice, a recommendation, or a valuation to rely on. Conventions differ by market and jurisdiction and change over time. See the full disclaimer.