Capital, in addition to labour (Division of labour, Wages), is one of the main factors of production. It is invested as real capital in the means of production such as buildings (Factory), machines (Technology), etc. or is used in the form of monetary capital to finance operative business.

In 1867, Karl Marx, in a chapter entitled “The General Formula for Capital” in his famous, central work Capital, wrote: “The circulation of commodities is the starting-point of capital. The production of commodities, their circulation, and that more developed form of their circulation called commerce, these form the historical ground-work from which it rises. The modern history of capital dates from the creation in the 16th century of a world-embracing commerce and a world-embracing market.” For the development of his economic theory of capital, Marx focused on the final product of commodity circulation: money. He wrote: “this final product of the circulation of commodities is the first form in which capital appears”.