A natural hedge is an exposure offset by the ordinary shape of the business rather than by a purchased instrument: revenue and costs in the same currency, borrowing in the currency of the assets it funds, or input prices that move with output prices. No standard-setter or regulator defines it as such; it is treasury and accounting shorthand for an arrangement that happens to reduce exposure. The caution is that the offset holds only while the underlying relationship holds — matched currencies can diverge in timing, volumes can move independently, and a price correlation can break exactly when it is being relied on. Because nothing is documented as a hedge, there is often no hedge accounting and no counterparty: the protection is real but conditional.
Why this entry carries no source list. This lexicon cites an official primary source wherever one exists and says so plainly where none does. This term is market convention: it was coined by commercial practice, it is used by everyone in the trade, and no body defines it. Pointing at a carrier’s tariff, a bank’s product page or a trade association’s explainer would dress one participant’s usage as a general rule. The practical upshot runs through the paragraph above — where the word carries no fixed meaning, the contract has to supply one.