bankrupt

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   Unable to pay your debts, and officially declared so by a court.

   The company went bankrupt after losing its biggest customer.

2. 2
   verb

   To make a person or company lose all their money.

   The failed investment nearly bankrupted the entire family.

3. 3
   noun

   A person who has been officially declared unable to pay their debts.

   As a bankrupt, he was not allowed to run a business for several years.

4. 4
   adj

   Completely lacking a good quality you should have.

   Voters saw the regime as morally bankrupt.

Partial calque of Italian bancarotta (literally “a broken bench”), from banca (“bank”, literally “bench”) + rotta (“broken, rupted”), which refers to an out-of-business bank, having its bench physically broken, signifying that the working moneylender was insolvent.

Topics