Commercial Code

Not the computer program that allows Amazon to guess that you like coffee table books of 1940s pin-up photography. It's also not an Omerta-like set of unspoken rules that govern traders' interaction with each other. Instead, it's the set of U.S. laws that pertain to business.

Also known as the "uniform commercial code," these rules regulate all aspects of commerce, from contracts to promissory notes to banking rules. The first UCC was published in the 1950s with the goal of getting most jurisdictions in the U.S. to follow the same general set of rules. Particular laws very from state to state, but the UCC forms the central influence on commercial law in the U.S.