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hedge

[hej]

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SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR hedge ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

a row of bushes or small trees planted close together, especially when forming a fence or boundary; hedgerow: small fields separated by hedges.

any barrier or boundary: a hedge of stones.

an act or means of preventing complete loss of a bet, an argument, an investment, or the like, with a partially counterbalancing or qualifying one.

verb (used with object), hedged, hedg·ing.

to enclose with or separate by a hedge: to hedge a garden.

to surround and confine as if with a hedge; restrict (often followed by in, about, etc.): He felt hedged in by the rules of language.

to protect with qualifications that allow for unstated contingencies or for withdrawal from commitment: He hedged his program against attack and then presented it to the board.

to mitigate a possible loss by counterbalancing (one's bets, investments, etc.).

to prevent or hinder free movement; obstruct: to be hedged by poverty.

verb (used without object), hedged, hedg·ing.

to avoid a rigid commitment by qualifying or modifying a position so as to permit withdrawal: He felt that he was speaking too boldly and began to hedge before they could contradict him.

to prevent complete loss of a bet by betting an additional amount or amounts against the original bet.

Finance. to enter transactions that will protect against loss through a compensatory price movement.

Origin of hedge

before 900; Middle English, Old English hegge; cognate with Dutch heg, German Hecke hedge, Old Norse heggr bird cherry

Related formshedge·less, adjectiveun·hedge, verb (used with object), un·hedged, un·hedg·ing.un·hedged, adjectivewell-hedged, adjective

Synonyms for hedge

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR hedge ON THESAURUS.COM

9. evade, stall, delay, temporize, waffle.

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for hedging

sidestep, fudge, waffle, pussyfoot, shuffle, temporize, equivocate, stonewall, tergiversate, evade, prevaricate, stall, flip-flop, quibble, duck, shuck, jive, cage, hinder, coop

Examples from the Web for hedging

Contemporary Examples of hedging

The plaque honoring “la Nueve” speaks to how memory is often overlaid by the hedging of history.
Who Liberated Paris in August 1944?
August 24, 2014
Netanyahu has been eager to take credit for Iran's hedging of its stockpiles.
What Obama Said About Iran
Ali Gharib
March 22, 2013
Karl Rove says Romney has the edge in the overall vote on Election Day and in his hedging way seemed to predict a Romney triumph.
Mitt Romney’s Delusions of Victory
Matt Latimer
November 3, 2012
The entire phylum of what they do is called “hedging risk,” not diving into it.
Jack Hitt Examines Why Amateurs Are the Job Creators
Jack Hitt
June 9, 2012
The death of an uncle and a hedging competition are processed and recounted in due course.
The Duchess Tells All
Chloë Schama
November 25, 2010

Historical Examples of hedging

He was hedging because he thought he had gone too far, but she appeared not to notice it.
Crooked Trails and Straight
William MacLeod Raine
I might have hedged on my own stock, but I don't believe in hedging.
The Three Partners
Bret Harte
But as for that, signore, if you have no axes nor hedging knives, we have them.
Corleone
F. Marion Crawford
This gloom, hedging him on every side, troubled him with a vague fear.
The Kindred of the Wild
Charles G. D. Roberts
Some men were engaged in hedging, when they had to cut down some old trees.
Finger-Ring Lore
William Jones

British Dictionary definitions for hedging

hedge

noun

a row of shrubs, bushes, or trees forming a boundary to a field, garden, etc

a barrier or protection against something

the act or a method of reducing the risk of financial loss on an investment, bet, etc

a cautious or evasive statement

(modifier; often in combination) low, inferior, or illiteratea hedge lawyer

verb

(tr) to enclose or separate with or as if with a hedge

(intr) to make or maintain a hedge, as by cutting and laying

(tr; often foll by in, about, or around) to hinder, obstruct, or restrict

(intr) to evade decision or action, esp by making noncommittal statements

(tr) to guard against the risk of loss in (a bet, the paying out of a win, etc), esp by laying bets with other bookmakers

(intr) to protect against financial loss through future price fluctuations, as by investing in futures

Derived Formshedger, nounhedging, nounhedgy, adjective

Word Origin for hedge

Old English hecg; related to Old High German heckia, Middle Dutch hegge; see haw 1

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for hedging

hedge

v.

late 14c., "make a hedge," also "surround with a barricade or palisade;" from hedge (n.). The sense of "dodge, evade" is first recorded 1590s. That of "insure oneself against loss," as in a bet, by playing something on the other side is from 1670s, originally with in; probably from an earlier use of hedge in meaning "secure (a debt) by including it in a larger one which has better security" (1610s). Related: Hedged; hedging. The noun in the wagering sense is from 1736.

hedge

n.

Old English hecg, originally any fence, living or artificial, from West Germanic *khagja (cf. Middle Dutch hegge, Dutch heg, Old High German hegga, German Hecke "hedge"), from PIE *kagh- "to catch, seize; wickerwork, fence" (cf. Latin caulae "a sheepfold, enclosure," Gaulish caio "circumvallation," Welsh cae "fence, hedge"). Related to Old English haga "enclosure, hedge" (see haw). Figurative sense of "boundary, barrier" is from mid-14c. Prefixed to any word, it "notes something mean, vile, of the lowest class" [Johnson], from contemptuous attributive sense of "plying one's trade under a hedge" (hedge-priest, hedge-lawyer, hedge-wench, etc.), a usage attested from 1530s.

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper

hedging in Culture

hedging

The practice by which a business or investor limits risk by taking positions that tend to offset each other. For example, a business stands to lose money if the price of a commodity it holds declines, but it can offset this risk by agreeing to sell a specified amount of the commodity at a set price at some point in the future.

Note

Hedge funds, which are investment funds usually open only to the very wealthy, grew in the 1990s. The near failure of one such fund in 1998, Long-Term Capital Management, sent shock waves through Wall Street.

The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.