Thursday, August 10, 2017

What do "business clout" and "at the margin" mean in this context?





  1. The results show Singapore’s growing business clout, driven in part by an expanding financial and insurance industry, which makes up about 13 percent of the economy.





  2. “London will remain a major financial center,” he said. “At the margin there will some shift to other financial centers in Europe.”




source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-06/forget-paris-singapore-seen-as-best-business-hub-after-london



Answer



Clout refers to the influence or power that someone or something has in specific contexts:




  • When you speak of someone having clout, it usually means that they communicate a sense of power or influence, particularly in the political sense. "You’ll wanna talk to that big guy over there if you want me to let you in. He’s got clout."


  • Clout can also mean to hit someone really hard — either the hit you give (“that’s a big clout he just landed”) or the act of hitting (“she clouted him with a baseball bat”). Of course, the sense of having power and the actual hitting are related, since clout is something to be wielded — either physically or figuratively. Note: it's not just tough guys who have clout. China is said to have "growing economic clout," and Oprah is known to have significant clout in the media industry.



(Vocabulary.com)



  • In the sentence it refers to the growing influence that Singapore has in financial business.


Business clout:






  • “Clout” refers to your relative bargaining power in a business relationship.



    • In the drinks business, for instance, “distribution clout” refers to the negotiation power the drinks company has with their distributors and retailers – relative to their competitors. It is a very real source of competitive advantage that can result in better promotion, visibility and trade terms than the competition.





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