Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, Lenin defined the five “basic features” of imperialism:
(1) the concentration of production and capital developed to such a high stage that it created monopolies which play a decisive role in economic life; (2) the merging of banking capital with industrial capital, and the creation, on the basis of this “finance capital,” of a financial oligarchy; (3) the export of capital as distinguished from the export of commodities acquires exceptional importance; (4) the formation of international monopolist capitalist associations which share the world among themselves, and (5) the territorial division of the whole world among the biggest capitalist powers is completed.