liquidate

CEFRB2

/ˈlɪkwɪdeɪt/

verb

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    verb

    To close a business and sell its property to pay debts.

  2. 02

    verb

    Extra detail

    To make (a sound) less harsh.

Examples

  • Shareholders voted to liquidate the company's assets.

  • The Soviet Union tried to liquidate religion from the Soviet life.

At a glance

Sits at B2 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
1
Citations
5
Synonyms
5

Deep Dive

verb

Extra meanings
  1. To use up (money or other assets) wastefully; to dissipate, to squander, to waste.

  2. Synonym of liquefy (“to make (something) into a liquid”); to liquidize.

  3. To convert (assets) into cash; to encash, to realize, to redeem.

More examples

In context
  • COVID-19 hit the company hard—I foresee it will liquidate within a year.

  • A Drunkard is a Creature God ne're made, / The Species Man, the Nature retrograde, / […] / Thoſe damn themſelves to heap an ill-got Store, / Theſe liquidate their VVealth, and covet to be poor.

  • [R]eturn to thy maſter, and tell him, e'er vve liquidate our differences by the ſvvord, Manfred vvould hold ſome converſe vvith him.

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

The struggling company had to blank its assets to pay off all debts quickly.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

verb

Learned borrowing from Late Latin liquidātus (“liquid; clear”, adjective) + English -ate (suffix forming verbs, and forming adjectives with the sense ‘characterized by [the specified things]’). Liquidātus is the perfect passive participle of liquidō (“to turn into a liquid, melt; to make clear”), from Latin liquidus (“fluid, liquid; clear, transparent”) + -ō (suffix forming regular first-conjugation verbs); while liquidus is from liqueō (“to be fluid or liquid; to be clear or transparent”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *wleykʷ- (“to make wet; moist”)) + -idus (suffix meaning ‘tending to’ forming adjectives). By surface analysis, liquid (adjective) + -ate. Verb sense 1.2.3 (“to kill;...