Financial services are the products and services offered by financial institutions. These services help individuals, businesses, and governments manage their money and finances. Financial services include everything from banks, credit unions, and credit card companies to investment firms and insurance agencies. In addition, financial services also encompass debt management, foreign exchange, and payments systems.

The financial services industry may seem all-encompassing today, but it wasn’t always this way. Before the 1970s, each sector of the financial services industry stayed fairly separate from one another. Banks focused on providing consumers with banking products like checking and savings accounts, loans and mortgages while brokers provided consumers with investment opportunities by selling mutual funds and stocks.

Now, the lines between each sector of the financial services industry have become blurred, with many businesses offering a broad range of products and services. This allows individuals and businesses to save time by dealing with fewer different financial service providers, as well as reduce their costs.

A healthy financial services industry is vital for the economy as a whole. It provides people with access to the money they need for mortgages, car purchases, education, and more. It enables individuals to save for retirement, health care, and other life events and safeguards their assets with insurance policies. It also allows businesses to expand and grow by facilitating the free flow of capital and market liquidity.

Ready to jumpstart your career in financial services? Check out our tips to get your foot in the door and make an impact in this exciting, highly-demanding industry.