Assets which are themselves money, or can be converted into money with minimum delay and risk of loss. Short-dated marketable securities such as Treasury bills are liquid assets. Longer-dated securities, which may change in value as interest rates vary, are not liquid, nor are shares or commodities whose price is liable to vary, even if they are readily marketable. Real assets such as unincorporated businesses or houses are especially illiquid: they cannot reliably be sold quickly, and the price they will fetch is very uncertain.