invest
/ɪnˈvɛst
/verb [with object]
1Put (money) into financial schemes, shares, property, or a commercial venture with the expectation of achieving a profit: the company is to invest £12 m in its manufacturing site at Linlithglow [no object]: getting workers to invest in private pension funds...
- These open-ended funds may invest in a basket of individual stocks, while more conservative funds will invest their money on the bond market.
- This may cause some concern to Irish people who have invested money in residential property in Britain, but most economic commentators are confident that the market is not set to collapse.
- It is expected that fund managers will be investing new money in foreign stocks rather than actively selling Irish ones.
Synonyms
put money into, sink money into, lay out money on, plough money into;
provide capital for, spend money on, fund, back, finance, underwrite, subsidize, support, pay for;
buy into, buy shares in, buy/take a stake in
informal get a piece of, splash out on
1.1Devote (one’s time, effort, or energy) to a particular undertaking with the expectation of a worthwhile result: we have invested a considerable amount of time in demonstrating the value of the system...
- Joseph said while some people were looking for instant gratification, one had to be willing to invest effort and energy to get the desired results.
- I feel that she is being insensitive to the fact that I just need to know there is some potential or otherwise I have to invest my energy elsewhere.
- But instead of investing his energy into outward noise that drifts skywards into nothingness, you sense he invests energy inwards, into making himself the best that he can be.
Synonyms
spend, expend, lay out, put in, plough in, use up, devote;
venture, speculate, risk, gamble;
contribute, donate, give
1.2 [no object] (invest in) informal Buy (a relatively expensive product) whose usefulness will repay the cost: I invested in an expensive moisturizer and tried to drink more water...
- The high retention rate is also partly due to the time, care, and expense the company invests in recruiting.
2 (invest someone/thing with) Provide or endow someone or something with (a particular quality or attribute): the passage of time has invested the words with an unintended humour...
- Bhabha invests the boundary with the importance as providing the genesis of presence.
- Laid back and lanky, he invests the character with the tensile quality of a coiled spring and a panther-like sensuality that is striking.
- She invests her great grandmother with a mysterious exotic quality.
Synonyms
imbue, infuse, perfuse, charge, steep, saturate, suffuse, pervade, fill, endow
2.1Formally confer a rank or office on (someone): he was invested as Head of State on 1 October 1936...
- She was invested with her chain and robes of office at a ceremony in the Watson Hall on Monday.
- He was invested with the award in a ceremony on June 12 at Government House by the Administrator of the Commonwealth, Sir Guy Green.
- Palace officials will spend the summer drawing up the mission statement, representing Charles's assessment of his role over the 33 years since he was invested as Prince of Wales.
Synonyms
admit to office, instate, install, induct, swear in;
ordain, anoint;
crown, enthrone
2.2 (invest something in) Confer a right or power on (someone or something): all executive powers were invested in the Secretary of State...
- Should the shareholders invest their hopes in the power of prayer?
- No statutory provision invests the Governor in Council with a power of removing members of the police force from office.
- We must not make an idolatry of modern medicine, investing powers in the medical establishment far beyond its true capacity.
Synonyms
vest in, endow in, confer on, bestow on, grant to, entrust to, give to, consign to, put in someone's hands
3 archaic Clothe or cover with a garment: he stands before you invested in the full canonicals of his calling
4 archaic Surround (a place) in order to besiege or blockade it: Fort Pulaski was invested and captured...
- On 5 May the Japanese Second Army landed north of Port Arthur, cutting it off from the Russian Manchurian Army, followed by Third Army under Nogi which invested the place on 26 June.
- In 1153, Baldwin launched a major attack on Ascalon, with an army large enough to invest the great city completely.
Derivatives
investable
- They say they will target customers with investable assets of between $100,000 and $500,000.
- Yu figures Chinese in America possess $200 billion in investable assets.
- Among substantial investors, those with more than $100,000 in investable assets, expectations increased to 10.7 percent in March from 8.8 per cent last month.
investible
/ adjective ...- ‘The 0.15 per cent turnover tax on investment will be a burden on the cost of management of investible funds,’ says Ghosh.
- For example, the superannuation sector's investible pool which will be nudging a trillion dollars next year is being force fed with about $50 billion of new money each year.
- Unlike well irrigation, which depends upon the investible capacity of farmers, public canals benefit all classes of farmers in proportion to the area they hold in the command area.
Origin
Mid 16th century (in the senses 'clothe', 'clothe with the insignia of a rank', and 'endow with authority'): from French investir or Latin investire, from in- 'into, upon' + vestire 'clothe' (from vestis 'clothing'). sense 1 (early 17th century) is influenced by Italian investire.
The root of invest is Latin vestis ‘clothes’, also the source of vest (Late Middle English), and which shares an Indo-European root with wear (Old English). Latin investire meant ‘to put clothes on someone’, and was the sense of invest when it entered English in the mid 16th century. Someone being formally installed in a job or office would once have been ceremonially dressed in special clothing, and this is behind the sense ‘to formally confer a rank or office on someone’. The main modern use of the word is financial—putting money into a commercial venture with the expectation of profit. This came into English under the influence of a related Italian word in the early 17th century, apparently through a comparison between putting money into various enterprises and dressing it in a variety of clothing.