COBOL is a computer programming language initially developed in 1959 to process business data like finance and records. It is structured hierarchically with divisions, sections, paragraphs and statements to organize code. COBOL supports numeric, alphanumeric and alphabetic data types as well as arithmetic, logical and relational operators. Expressions, branching, input/output, iterations and comments are implemented through statements, mnemonic codes and verbs like ADD, BE, PERFORM and *.