Income
A strategy whose return accrues from holding a position over time — a yield, a roll, or a spread that converges — rather than from a change in direction.
Why it matters
Income strategies earn steadily and lose suddenly. The premium exists because the holder is compensated for bearing a risk that is usually dormant, which means the return series looks excellent right up until the risk it was compensating for arrives. Carry is the canonical example, and its drawdown profile is the reason position sizing matters more here than in any other family.
What it is not
These are routinely confused with Income. The distinctions are not pedantic — each one has consequences for how a system is governed.
Fixed income is an asset class. Income here is a return source and appears across FX, commodities and equities.
Relationships
Typed edges into the rest of the ontology. These are what make the canon traversable rather than merely readable.
| Verb | Target | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
relatedTo | Risk premium | An association too weak or too general for a stronger verb. |
Record
| Canonical identifier | QIS-TERM-00034 |
| Status | Canonical industry term |
| Adoption | Widely used |
| Domain · Layer | Strategy families · Capital |
| Origin | Standard classification in systematic investing. |
| Semantic aliases | None recorded. |
| First published | 2026-08-02 |
| Last reviewed | 2026-08-02 · 180-day cycle |
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