A ticker symbol or stock symbol is an abbreviation used to uniquely identify publicly traded shares of a particular stock on a particular stock market. A stock symbol may consist of numbers or a combination of both. "Ticker symbol" refers to the symbols. Stock symbols are unique identifiers assigned to each security traded on a particular market. A stock symbol can consist of letters, numbers, or a combination of both, is a way to uniquely identify that stock; the symbols were kept as short as possible to reduce the number of characters that had to be printed on the ticker tape, to make it easy to recognize by traders and investors. The allocation of symbols and formatting convention is specific to each stock exchange. In the US, for example, stock tickers are between 1 and 4 letters and represent the company name where possible. For example, US-based computer company stock Apple Inc. traded on the NASDAQ exchange has the symbol AAPL, while the motor company Ford's stock, traded on the New York Stock Exchange has the single-letter ticker F.
In Europe, most exchanges use three-letter codes, for example Dutch consumer goods company Unilever traded on the Amsterdam Euronext exchange has the symbol UNA. While in Asia, numbers are used as stock tickers to avoid issues for international investors when using non-Latin scripts. For example, the bank HSBC's stock traded on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange has the ticker symbol 0005. Symbols sometimes change to reflect mergers. Prior to the 1999 merger with Mobil Oil, Exxon used a phonetic spelling of the company "XON" as its ticker symbol; the symbol of the firm after the merger was "XOM". Symbols are sometimes reused. In the US the single-letter symbols are sought after as vanity symbols. For example, since Mar 2008 Visa Inc. has used the symbol V, used by Vivendi which had delisted and given up the symbol. To qualify a stock, both the ticker and the exchange or country of listing needs to be known. On many systems both must be specified to uniquely identify the security; this is done by appending the location or exchange code to the ticker.
Although stock tickers identify a security, they are exchange dependent limited to stocks and can change. These limitations have led to the development of other codes in financial markets to identify securities for settlement purposes; the most prevalent of these is the International Securities Identifying Number. An ISIN uniquely identifies a security and its structure is defined in ISO 6166. Securities for which ISINs are issued include bonds, commercial paper and warrants; the ISIN code is a 12-character alpha-numerical code that does not contain information characterizing financial instruments, but serves for uniform identification of a security at trading and settlement. The ISIN identifies not the exchange on which it trades. For instance, Daimler AG stock trades on twenty-two different stock exchanges worldwide, is priced in five different currencies. ISIN cannot specify a particular trade in this case, another identifier the three- or four-letter exchange code will have to be specified in addition to the ISIN.
While a stock ticker identifies a security that can be traded, stock market indices are sometimes assigned a symbol though they can not be traded. Symbols for indices are distinguished by adding a symbol in front of the name, such as a caret or a dot. For example, Reuters lists the Nasdaq Composite index under the symbol. IXIC. In Canada the Toronto Stock Exchange TSX and the TSXV use the following special codes after the ticker symbol: In the United Kingdom, prior to 1996, stock codes were known as EPICs, named after the London Stock Exchange's Exchange Price Information Computer. Following the introduction of the Sequence trading platform in 1996, EPICs were renamed Tradable Instrument Display Mnemonics, but they are still referred to as EPICs. Stocks can be identified using their SEDOL number or their ISIN. In the United States, modern letter-only ticker symbols were developed by Standard & Poor's to bring a national standard to investing. A single company could have many different ticker symbols as they varied between the dozens of individual stock markets.
The term ticker refers to the noise made by the ticker tape machines once used by stock exchanges. The S&P system was standardized by the securities industry and modified as years passed. Stock symbols for preferred stock have not been standardized; some companies use a well-known product as their ticker symbol. Belgian brewer InBev, the brewer of Budweiser beer, uses "BUD" as its three-letter ticker for American Depository Receipts, symbolizing its premier product in the United States, its rival, Molson Coors Brewing Company, uses a beer-related symbol, "TAP". Southwest Airlines pays tribute to its headquarters at Love Field in Dallas through its "LUV" symbol. Cedar Fair Entertainment Company, which operates large amusement parks in the United States, uses "FUN" as its symbol. Harley-Davidson uses "HOG" for its Harley Owners Group. Yamana Gold uses "AUY", because on the periodic table of elements. Sotheby's uses the symbol "BID". While most symbols come from the company's name, sometimes it happens the other way around.
Tricon Global, owner of KFC, Pi
Internet Protocol television is the delivery of television content over Internet Protocol networks. This is in contrast to delivery through traditional terrestrial and cable television formats. Unlike downloaded media, IPTV offers the ability to stream the source media continuously; as a result, a client media player can begin playing the content immediately. This is known as streaming media. Although IPTV uses the Internet protocol it is not limited to television streamed from the Internet. IPTV is deployed in subscriber-based telecommunications networks with high-speed access channels into end-user premises via set-top boxes or other customer-premises equipment. IPTV is used for media delivery around corporate and private networks. IPTV in the telecommunications arena is notable for its ongoing standardisation process. IPTV services may be classified into three main groups: Live television and live media, with or without related interactivity. Many different definitions of IPTV have appeared, including elementary streams over IP networks, MPEG transport streams over IP networks and a number of proprietary systems.
One official definition approved by the International Telecommunication Union focus group on IPTV is: IPTV is defined as multimedia services such as television/video/audio/text/graphics/data delivered over IP based networks managed to provide the required level of quality of service and experience, security and reliability. Another definition of IPTV, relating to the telecommunications industry, is the one given by Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions IPTV Exploratory Group in 2005: IPTV is defined as the secure and reliable delivery to subscribers of entertainment video and related services; these services may include, for example, Live TV, Video On Demand and Interactive TV. These services are delivered across an access agnostic, packet switched network that employs the IP protocol to transport the audio and control signals. In contrast to video over the public Internet, with IPTV deployments, network security and performance are managed to ensure a superior entertainment experience, resulting in a compelling business environment for content providers and customers alike.
The term IPTV first appeared in 1995 with the founding of Precept Software by Judith Estrin and Bill Carrico. Precept developed an Internet video product named IP/TV. IP/TV was an Mbone compatible Windows and Unix-based application that transmitted single and multi-source audio and video traffic, ranging from low to DVD quality, using both unicast and IP multicast Real-time Transport Protocol and Real time control protocol; the software was written by Steve Casner, Karl Auerbach, Cha Chee Kuan. Precept was acquired by Cisco Systems in 1998. Cisco retains the IP/TV trademark. Internet radio company AudioNet started the first continuous live webcasts with content from WFAA-TV in January 1998 and KCTU-LP on 10 January 1998. Kingston Communications, a regional telecommunications operator in the UK, launched Kingston Interactive Television, an IPTV over digital subscriber line service in September 1999; the operator added additional VoD service in October 2001 with a VoD content provider. Kingston was one of the first companies in the world to introduce IPTV and IP VoD over ADSL as a commercial service.
The service became the reference for various changes to UK Government regulations and policy on IPTV. In 2006, the KIT service was discontinued, subscribers having declined from a peak of 10,000 to 4,000. In 1999, NBTel was the first to commercially deploy Internet protocol television over DSL in Canada using the Alcatel 7350 DSLAM and middleware created by iMagic TV; the service was marketed under the brand VibeVision in New Brunswick, expanded into Nova Scotia in early 2000 after the formation of Aliant. IMagic TV was sold to Alcatel. In 2002, Sasktel was the second in Canada to commercially deploy IPTV over DSL, using the Lucent Stinger DSL platform. In 2005, SureWest Communications was the first North American company to offer high-definition television channels over an IPTV service. In 2005, Bredbandsbolaget launched its IPTV service as the first service provider in Sweden; as of January 2009, they are not the biggest supplier any longer. In 2007, TPG became the first internet service provider in Australia to launch IPTV.
By 2010, iiNet and Telstra launched IPTV services in conjunction to internet plans. In 2008, Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited launched IPTV under the brand name of PTCL Smart TV in Pakistan; this service is available in 150 major cities of the country offering 140 live channels. In 2010, CenturyLink – after acquiring Embarq and Qwest – entered five U. S. markets with an IPTV service called Prism. This was after successful test marketing in Florida. In 2016, Korean Central Television introduced the set-top box called Manbang providing video-on-demand services in North Korea via quasi-internet protocol television. Manbang allows viewers to watch five different TV channels in real-time, read find political information regarding the Supreme Leader and Juche ideology, read articles from state-run news organizations; the technology was hindered by low broadb
Uruguay the Oriental Republic of Uruguay, is a country in the southeastern region of South America. It borders Argentina to its west and Brazil to its north and east, with the Río de la Plata to the south and the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast. Uruguay is home to an estimated 3.44 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the metropolitan area of its capital and largest city, Montevideo. With an area of 176,000 square kilometres, Uruguay is geographically the second-smallest nation in South America, after Suriname. Uruguay was inhabited by the Charrúa people for 4,000 years before the Portuguese established Colonia del Sacramento in 1680. Montevideo was founded as a military stronghold by the Spanish in the early 18th century, signifying the competing claims over the region. Uruguay won its independence between 1811 and 1828, following a four-way struggle between Spain and Argentina and Brazil, it remained subject to foreign influence and intervention throughout the 19th century, with the military playing a recurring role in domestic politics.
A series of economic crises put an end to a democratic period that had begun in the early 20th century, culminating in a 1973 coup, which established a civic-military dictatorship. The military government persecuted leftists and political opponents, resulting in several deaths and numerous instances of torture by the military. Uruguay is today a democratic constitutional republic, with a president who serves as both head of state and head of government. Uruguay is ranked first in Latin America in democracy, low perception of corruption, e-government, is first in South America when it comes to press freedom, size of the middle class and prosperity. On a per-capita basis, Uruguay contributes more troops to United Nations peacekeeping missions than any other country, it tops the rank of absence of a unique position within South America. It ranks second in the region on economic freedom, income equality, per-capita income and inflows of FDI. Uruguay is the third-best country on the continent in terms of HDI, GDP growth and infrastructure.
It is regarded as a high-income country by the UN. Uruguay was ranked the third-best in the world in e-Participation in 2014. Uruguay is an important global exporter of combed wool, soybeans, frozen beef and milk. Nearly 95% of Uruguay's electricity comes from renewable energy hydroelectric facilities and wind parks. Uruguay is a founding member of the United Nations, OAS, Mercosur, UNASUR and NAM. Uruguay is regarded as one of the most advanced countries in Latin America, it ranks high on global measures of personal rights and inclusion issues. The Economist named Uruguay "country of the year" in 2013, acknowledging the policy of legalizing the production and consumption of cannabis; the name of the namesake river comes from the Spanish pronunciation of the regional Guarani word for it. There are several interpretations, including "bird-river"; the name could refer to a river snail called uruguá, plentiful in the water. In Spanish colonial times, for some time thereafter and some neighbouring territories were called the Cisplatina and Banda Oriental for a few years the "Eastern Province".
Since its independence, the country has been known as la República Oriental del Uruguay, which means "the eastern republic of the Uruguay ". However, it is translated either as the "Oriental Republic of Uruguay" or the "Eastern Republic of Uruguay"; the documented inhabitants of Uruguay before European colonization of the area were the Charrúa, a small tribe driven south by the Guarani of Paraguay. It is estimated that there were about 9,000 Charrúa and 6,000 Chaná and Guaraní at the time of contact with Europeans in the 1500s. Fructuoso Rivera - Uruguay's first president – organized the Charruas' genocide; the Portuguese were the first Europeans to enter the region of present-day Uruguay in 1512. The Spanish arrived in present-day Uruguay in 1516; the indigenous peoples' fierce resistance to conquest, combined with the absence of gold and silver, limited their settlement in the region during the 16th and 17th centuries. Uruguay became a zone of contention between the Spanish and Portuguese empires.
In 1603, the Spanish began to introduce cattle. The first permanent Spanish settlement was founded in 1624 at Soriano on the Río Negro. In 1669–71, the Portuguese built a fort at Colonia del Sacramento. Montevideo was founded by the Spanish in the early 18th century as a military stronghold in the country, its natural harbor soon developed into a commercial area competing with Río de la Plata's capital, Buenos Aires. Uruguay's early 19th century history was shaped by ongoing fights for dominance in the Platine region, between British, Spanish and other colonial forces. In 1806 and 1807, the British army attempted to seize Buenos Aires and Montevideo as part of the Napoleonic Wars. Montevideo was occupied by a British force from February to September 1807. In 1811, José Gervasio Artigas, who became Uruguay's national hero, launched a successful revolt against the Spanish authorities, defeating them on 18 May at the Battle of Las Piedras. In 1813, the new government in Buenos Aires convened a constituent assembly where Artigas emerged as a champ
A landline telephone is a phone that uses a metal wire or optical fiber telephone line for transmission as distinguished from a mobile cellular line, which uses radio waves for transmission. In 2003, the CIA World Factbook reported 1.263 billion main telephone lines worldwide. China had more than any other country at 350 million and the United States was second with 268 million; the United Kingdom had 23.7 million residential fixed home phones. The 2013 statistics show that the total number of fixed-telephone subscribers in the world was about 1.16 billion. The number of landline subscribers continuously decreases due to upgrades in digital technology and the conveniences that come with switching to wireless or Internet-based alternatives. A fixed phone line can be hard-wired or cordless and refers to the operation of wireless devices or systems in fixed locations such as homes. Fixed wireless devices derive their electrical power from the utility mains electricity, unlike mobile wireless or portable wireless, which tend to be battery-powered.
Although mobile and portable systems can be used in fixed locations and bandwidth are compromised compared with fixed systems. Mobile or portable, battery-powered wireless systems can be used as emergency backups for fixed systems in case of a power blackout or natural disaster; the term landline is used to describe a connection between two or more points that consists of a dedicated physical cable, as opposed to an always-available private link, implemented as a circuit in a wired switched system. So-called leased lines are invariably of the latter type. For example, a military headquarters might be linked to front-line units "by landline" to ensure that communication remains possible if the conventional telephone network is damaged or destroyed. Another example of this is in airports. All air traffic control towers have dedicated lines connected to the police, fire department, army, etc. Deployed as a precaution in case of emergency, these can be used at any time. In many countries the landline has not been available to most people.
In some countries in Africa, the rise in cell phones has outpaced any rise in landline telephones. Between 1998 and 2008, Africa added only 2.4 million landlines. During this same time the number of mobile phone lines that have been subscribed to has skyrocketed. Between 2000 and 2008, cell phone use has risen from fewer than 2 in 100 people to 33 out of 100, it is more difficult to install landline copper wires to every user, than it is to install mobile wireless towers that people can connect to from anywhere. There has been substantial decline of landline phones in Indian subcontinent, in urban and more in rural areas. In the early 21st century, the landline telephone has declined due to the advancement of mobile network technology and the obsolescence of the old copper wire networking; these metallic networks will be deemed out of date and replaced by more efficient broadband and fiber optic landline connections extending to rural areas and places where telecommunication was much more sparse.
Some see this happening as soon as the year 2025. In 2004, only about 45% of people in the United States between the ages of 12 and 17 owned cell phones. At that time, they had to rely on landline telephones. In just 4 years' time, that percentage climbed to about 71%; that same year, about 77 % of adults owned a mobile phone. In the year 2013, 91% of adults in the United States owned a mobile phone. 60% of those with a mobile had a smartphone. A National Health Interview Survey of 19,956 households by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released May 4, 2017 showed only 45.9 percent of U. S. households still had landlines. Over 39 percent had both. In Canada, more than one in five of households use cell phones as their only source for telephone service. In 2013, statistics showed. Households that are owned by members under the age of 35 have a higher percentage of exclusive cell phone use. In 2013, 60% of young household owners claimed to only use cell phones. Many of the consumer protections which regulators apply to incumbent landline providers, such as restrictions against cutting off subscribers without notice, do not apply to competing communication services such as cable modems and voice over IP.
Plain old telephone service Local loop Last mile Telephone Field telephone
Paraguay the Republic of Paraguay, is a country of South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to the east and northeast, Bolivia to the northwest. Although it is one of the only two landlocked countries in South America, the country has coasts and ports on the Paraguay and Paraná rivers that give exit to the Atlantic Ocean through the Paraná-Paraguay Waterway. Due to its central location in South America, it is sometimes referred to as Corazón de Sudamérica. Spanish conquistadores arrived in 1524 after navigating northwards from the Río de la Plata to the Paraná River, up the Paraguay River. In 1537, they established the city of Asunción, the first capital of the Governorate of Paraguay and Río de la Plata. Paraguay was the epicenter of the Jesuit Missions, where the Guaraní people were educated and introduced to Christianity and European culture under the direction of the Society of Jesus in Jesuit reductions during the 17th century. However, after the expulsion of the Jesuits from Spanish territories in 1767, Paraguay became a peripheral colony, with few urban centers and settlers.
Following independence from Spain at the beginning of the 19th century, Paraguay was ruled by a series of authoritarian governments who implemented nationalist and protectionist policies. This period ended with the disastrous Paraguayan War, during which Paraguay lost at least 50% of its prewar population and around 25–33% of its territory to the Triple Alliance of Argentina and Uruguay. In the 20th century, Paraguay faced another major international conflict – the Chaco War – against Bolivia, from which the Paraguayans emerged victorious. Afterwards, the country entered a period of military dictatorships, ending with the 35 year regime of Alfredo Stroessner that lasted until he was toppled in 1989 by an internal military coup; this marked the beginning of the "democratic era" of Paraguay. With around 7 million inhabitants, Paraguay is a founding member of Mercosur, an original member of the United Nations, the Organization of American States, the Non-Aligned Movement and the Lima Group; the city of Luque, in Asuncion's Metropolitan Area, is the seat of the CONMEBOL.
The Guarani culture is influential and more than 90% of the people speak different forms of the Guarani language on top of Spanish. Paraguayans are known for being a happy and easy-living people and many times the country topped the "world's happiest place" charts because of the "positive experiences" lived and expressed by the population; the indigenous Guaraní had been living in eastern Paraguay for at least a millennium before the arrival of the Spanish. Western Paraguay, the Gran Chaco, was inhabited by nomads of whom the Guaycuru peoples were the most prominent; the Paraguay River was the dividing line between the agricultural Guarani people to the east and the nomadic and semi-nomadic people to the west in the Gran Chaco. The Guarcuru nomads were known for their warrior traditions and were not pacified until the late 19th century; these indigenous tribes belonged to five distinct language families, which were the bases of their major divisions. Differing language speaking groups were competitive over resources and territories.
They were further divided into tribes by speaking languages in branches of these families. Today 17 separate ethnolinguistic groups remain; the first Europeans in the area were Spanish explorers in 1516. The Spanish explorer Juan de Salazar de Espinosa founded the settlement of Asunción on 15 August 1537; the city became the center of a Spanish colonial province of Paraguay. An attempt to create an autonomous Christian Indian nation was undertaken by Jesuit missions and settlements in this part of South America in the eighteenth century, which included portions of Uruguay and Brazil, they developed Jesuit reductions to bring Guarani populations together at Spanish missions and protect them from virtual slavery by Spanish settlers and Portuguese slave raiders, the Bandeirantes. In addition to seeking their conversion to Christianity. Catholicism in Paraguay was influenced by the indigenous peoples; the reducciones flourished in eastern Paraguay for about 150 years, until the expulsion of the Jesuits by the Spanish Crown in 1767.
The ruins of two 18th-century Jesuit Missions of La Santísima Trinidad de Paraná and Jesús de Tavarangue have been designated as World Heritage Sites by UNESCO. In western Paraguay Spanish settlement and Christianity were resisted by the nomadic Guaycuru and other nomads from the 16th century onward. Most of these peoples were absorbed into the mestizo population in the 19th centuries. Paraguay overthrew the local Spanish administration on 14 May 1811. Paraguay's first dictator was José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia who ruled Paraguay from 1814 until his death in 1840, with little outside contact or influence, he intended to create a utopian society based on the French theorist Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Social Contract. Rodríguez de Francia established new laws that reduced the powers of the Catholic church and the cabinet, forbade colonial citizens from marrying one another and allowed them to marry only blacks, mulattoes or natives, in order to break the power of colonial-era elites and to create a mixed-race or mestizo society.
He cut off the rest of South America. Because of Francia's restrictions of freedom, Fulgencio Yegros and several other Independence-era
Puerto Rico the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and called Porto Rico, is an unincorporated territory of the United States located in the northeast Caribbean Sea 1,000 miles southeast of Miami, Florida. An archipelago among the Greater Antilles, Puerto Rico includes the eponymous main island and several smaller islands, such as Mona and Vieques; the capital and most populous city is San Juan. The territory's total population is 3.4 million. Spanish and English are the official languages. Populated by the indigenous Taíno people, Puerto Rico was colonized by Spain following the arrival of Christopher Columbus in 1493, it was contested by French and British, but remained a Spanish possession for the next four centuries. The island's cultural and demographic landscapes were shaped by the displacement and assimilation of the native population, the forced migration of African slaves, settlement from the Canary Islands and Andalusia. In the Spanish Empire, Puerto Rico played a secondary but strategic role compared to wealthier colonies like Peru and New Spain.
Spain's distant administrative control continued up to the end of the 19th century, producing a distinctive creole Hispanic culture and language that combined indigenous and European elements. In 1898, following the Spanish–American War, the United States acquired Puerto Rico under the terms of the Treaty of Paris. Puerto Ricans have been citizens of the United States since 1917, enjoy freedom of movement between the island and the mainland; as it is not a state, Puerto Rico does not have a vote in the United States Congress, which governs the territory with full jurisdiction under the Puerto Rico Federal Relations Act of 1950. However, Puerto Rico does have one non-voting member of the House called a Resident Commissioner; as residents of a U. S. territory, American citizens in Puerto Rico are disenfranchised at the national level and do not vote for president and vice president of the United States, nor pay federal income tax on Puerto Rican income. Like other territories and the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico does not have U.
S. senators. Congress approved a local constitution in 1952, allowing U. S. citizens on the territory to elect a governor. Puerto Rico's future political status has been a matter of significant debate. In early 2017, the Puerto Rican government-debt crisis posed serious problems for the government; the outstanding bond debt had climbed to $70 billion at a time with 12.4% unemployment. The debt had been increasing during a decade long recession; this was the second major financial crisis to affect the island after the Great Depression when the U. S. government, in 1935, provided relief efforts through the Puerto Rico Reconstruction Administration. On May 3, 2017, Puerto Rico's financial oversight board in the U. S. District Court for Puerto Rico filed the debt restructuring petition, made under Title III of PROMESA. By early August 2017, the debt was $72 billion with a 45% poverty rate. In late September 2017, Hurricane Maria made landfall in Puerto Rico; the island's electrical grid was destroyed, with repairs expected to take months to complete, provoking the largest power outage in American history.
Recovery efforts were somewhat slow in the first few months, over 200,000 residents had moved to the mainland State of Florida alone by late November 2017. Puerto Rico is Spanish for "rich port". Puerto Ricans call the island Borinquén – a derivation of Borikén, its indigenous Taíno name, which means "Land of the Valiant Lord"; the terms boricua and borincano derive from Borikén and Borinquen and are used to identify someone of Puerto Rican heritage. The island is popularly known in Spanish as la isla del encanto, meaning "the island of enchantment". Columbus named the island San Juan Bautista, in honor of Saint John the Baptist, while the capital city was named Ciudad de Puerto Rico. Traders and other maritime visitors came to refer to the entire island as Puerto Rico, while San Juan became the name used for the main trading/shipping port and the capital city; the island's name was changed to "Porto Rico" by the United States after the Treaty of Paris of 1898. The anglicized name was used by the U.
S. government and private enterprises. The name was changed back to Puerto Rico by a joint resolution in Congress introduced by Félix Córdova Dávila in 1931; the official name of the entity in Spanish is Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, while its official English name is Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. The ancient history of the archipelago, now Puerto Rico is not well known. Unlike other indigenous cultures in the New World which left behind abundant archeological and physical evidence of their societies, scant artifacts and evidence remain of the Puerto Rico's indigenous population. Scarce archaeological findings and early Spanish accounts from the colonial era constitute all, known about them; the first comprehensive book on the history of Puerto Rico was written by Fray Íñigo Abbad y Lasierra in 1786, nearly three centuries after the first Spaniards landed on the island. The first known settlers were the Ortoiroid people, an Archaic Period culture of Amerindian hunters and fishermen who migrated from the South American mainland.
Some scholars suggest their settlement dates back about 4,000 years. An archeological dig in 1990 on the island of Vieques found the remains of a man, designated as the "Puerto Ferro Man", dated to around 2000 BC; the Ortoiroid were displaced
Peru the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, in the west by the Pacific Ocean. Peru is a megadiverse country with habitats ranging from the arid plains of the Pacific coastal region in the west to the peaks of the Andes mountains vertically extending from the north to the southeast of the country to the tropical Amazon Basin rainforest in the east with the Amazon river. Peruvian territory was home to several ancient cultures. Ranging from the Norte Chico civilization in the 32nd century BC, the oldest civilization in the Americas and one of the five cradles of civilization, to the Inca Empire, the largest state in pre-Columbian America, the territory now including Peru has one of the longest histories of civilization of any country, tracing its heritage back to the 4th millennia BCE; the Spanish Empire conquered the region in the 16th century and established a viceroyalty that encompassed most of its South American colonies, with its capital in Lima.
Peru formally proclaimed independence in 1821, following the military campaigns of José de San Martín and Simón Bolívar, the decisive battle of Ayacucho, Peru secured independence in 1824. In the ensuing years, the country enjoyed relative economic and political stability, which ended shortly before the War of the Pacific with Chile. Throughout the 20th century, Peru endured armed territorial disputes, social unrest, internal conflicts, as well as periods of stability and economic upswing. Alberto Fujimori was elected to the presidency in 1990. Fujimori left the presidency in 2000 and was charged with human rights violations and imprisoned until his pardon by President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski in 2017. After the president's regime, Fujimori's followers, called Fujimoristas, have caused political turmoil for any opposing faction in power causing Pedro Pablo Kuczynski to resign in March 2018; the sovereign state of Peru is a representative democratic republic divided into 25 regions. It is classified as an emerging market with a high level of human development and an upper middle income level with a poverty rate around 19 percent.
It is one of the region's most prosperous economies with an average growth rate of 5.9% and it has one of the world's fastest industrial growth rates at an average of 9.6%. Its main economic activities include mining, manufacturing and fishing; the country forms part of The Pacific Pumas, a political and economic grouping of countries along Latin America's Pacific coast that share common trends of positive growth, stable macroeconomic foundations, improved governance and an openness to global integration. Peru ranks high in social freedom. Peru has a population of 32 million, which includes Amerindians, Europeans and Asians; the main spoken language is Spanish, although a significant number of Peruvians speak Quechua or other native languages. This mixture of cultural traditions has resulted in a wide diversity of expressions in fields such as art, cuisine and music; the name of the country may be derived from Birú, the name of a local ruler who lived near the Bay of San Miguel, Panama City, in the early 16th century.
When his possessions were visited by Spanish explorers in 1522, they were the southernmost part of the New World yet known to Europeans. Thus, when Francisco Pizarro explored the regions farther south, they came to be designated Birú or Perú. An alternative history is provided by the contemporary writer Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, son of an Inca princess and a conquistador, he said the name Birú was that of a common Indian happened upon by the crew of a ship on an exploratory mission for governor Pedro Arias de Ávila, went on to relate more instances of misunderstandings due to the lack of a common language. The Spanish Crown gave the name legal status with the 1529 Capitulación de Toledo, which designated the newly encountered Inca Empire as the province of Peru. Under Spanish rule, the country adopted the denomination Viceroyalty of Peru, which became Republic of Peru after independence; the earliest evidences of human presence in Peruvian territory have been dated to 9,000 BC. Andean societies were based on agriculture, terracing.
Organization relied on reciprocity and redistribution because these societies had no notion of market or money. The oldest known complex society in Peru, the Norte Chico civilization, flourished along the coast of the Pacific Ocean between 3,000 and 1,800 BC; these early developments were followed by archaeological cultures that developed around the coastal and Andean regions throughout Peru. The Cupisnique culture which flourished from around 1000 to 200 BC along what is now Peru's Pacific Coast was an example of early pre-Incan culture; the Chavín culture that developed from 1500 to 300 BC was more of a religious than a political phenomenon, with their religious centre in Chavín de Huantar. After the decline of the Chavin culture around the beginning of the 1st century AD, a series of localized and specialized cultures rose and fell