'financiera' originates from Spanish, ultimately borrowed from French 'financier' (from Middle French 'finance'), where 'finance' referred to a payment or settlement and derived from Vulgar Latin *finantia and Latin 'finis' meaning 'end'.

'finance' in Old/Middle French meant 'a payment' or 'settlement'; from that developed the agent/adjective forms like French 'financier'. Spanish adopted the related forms 'financiero'/'financiera', which came to denote matters or people connected with money and financial services.

Initially it referred to 'a payment' or 'settlement'; over time the sense shifted to management of money and financial affairs, and then to persons or companies involved in finance ('financier', 'financial').