4 ms·

When does M mean thousand? I've never seen that. K means thousand.

dragonwriter 4y ago
> When does M mean thousand? Its less common now, but historically the latin-derived “M” for 1000s and “MM” for millions was dominant in finance and accounting; metric-style “k” for 1000s and “M” for millions has become more popular, but you’ll occasionally still encounter the other style. https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/fixed-income/mm-millions/ https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/fixed-income...
satvikpendem 4y ago
M means milli in Latin, as in thousand (kilo comes from Greek). Millennium, millipede (thousand legs), and so on. Million just means a thousand thousands. That is why in most financial institutions, M means thousand, and MM means millions, literally thousand thousands.
- lotsofpulp 4y ago
  Do they use MMM for billions and MMMM for trillions? k, M, B, T, Q seem like easier to read suffixes as opposed to having to count the number of “M”s.
  - listenallyall 4y ago
    Yes, for billions at least. Never personally saw a bank transaction for a trillion dollars. You are correct the others are easier, clearer, etc. But banking goes back centuries, millennia even. When an entire industry uses a certain nomenclature, no individual participant wants to go through the hassle of trying to change everything.
- KoftaBob 4y ago
  I’ve always found this idiotic. This isn’t Renaissance Florence, using M to mean thousand is just financier gatekeeping snobbery.
  - kingofpandora 4y ago
    Is it more snobbish than using "k" to mean thousand?
  - s1artibartfast 4y ago
    Or perhaps institution see some value in keeping a consistent denotation when you have records spanning hundreds of years, multiple counties, and multiple languages.
- ls15 4y ago
  Which is weird to me, because MM in latin numerals is 2,000 There is a way to express one million as M̅ (horizontal bar above M for M * 1,000), but I think this was a later addon that was not used by the Romans. They probably rarely had to deal with numbers in the millions and if they did, they could just express them as a product like M * M
- rsj_hn 4y ago
  > That is why in most financial institutions, M means thousand, and MM means millions This is not the case in the United States.
0cf8612b2e1e 4y ago
Every currently employed accountant? All financial documents?

> When does M mean thousand? Its less common now, but historically the latin-derived “M” for 1000s and “MM” for millions was dominant in finance and accounting; metric-style “k” for 1000s and “M” for millions has become more popular, but you’ll occasionally still encounter the other style. https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/fixed-income/mm-millions/ https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/fixed-income...

satvikpendem 4y ago

M means milli in Latin, as in thousand (kilo comes from Greek). Millennium, millipede (thousand legs), and so on. Million just means a thousand thousands. That is why in most financial institutions, M means thousand, and MM means millions, literally thousand thousands.

lotsofpulp 4y ago
Do they use MMM for billions and MMMM for trillions? k, M, B, T, Q seem like easier to read suffixes as opposed to having to count the number of “M”s.
- listenallyall 4y ago
  Yes, for billions at least. Never personally saw a bank transaction for a trillion dollars. You are correct the others are easier, clearer, etc. But banking goes back centuries, millennia even. When an entire industry uses a certain nomenclature, no individual participant wants to go through the hassle of trying to change everything.
KoftaBob 4y ago
I’ve always found this idiotic. This isn’t Renaissance Florence, using M to mean thousand is just financier gatekeeping snobbery.
- kingofpandora 4y ago
  Is it more snobbish than using "k" to mean thousand?
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  Or perhaps institution see some value in keeping a consistent denotation when you have records spanning hundreds of years, multiple counties, and multiple languages.
ls15 4y ago
Which is weird to me, because MM in latin numerals is 2,000 There is a way to express one million as M̅ (horizontal bar above M for M * 1,000), but I think this was a later addon that was not used by the Romans. They probably rarely had to deal with numbers in the millions and if they did, they could just express them as a product like M * M
rsj_hn 4y ago
> That is why in most financial institutions, M means thousand, and MM means millions This is not the case in the United States.

0cf8612b2e1e 4y ago

Every currently employed accountant? All financial documents?