capital expenditure

American  

noun

Accounting, Finance.

1. an addition to the value of fixed assets, as by the purchase of a new building.

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capital expenditure British  

noun

1. expenditure on acquisitions of or improvements to fixed assets

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capital expenditure Cultural  

1. The purchase of an asset by a firm.

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Etymology

Origin of capital expenditure

First recorded in 1895–1900

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

capital expenditure

The management attributed the suspension to frontloaded capital expenditure.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 9, 2026

Yet capital expenditure among German companies remains on the decline, with economists pointing to a lack of reform in the country’s complex regulatory system as one factor holding back investment.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 9, 2026

Right now, annual data center capital expenditure lands roughly at $800 billion, but that’s expected to increase to $1.8 trillion in 2050.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 8, 2026

The upshot of this would be EPS-negative, lowering earnings per share expectations, Hartnett observes, but, overall, the political changes would challenge the K-shaped wealth boom and the surge of AI capital expenditure.

From MarketWatch ● Sep. 4, 2026

The extra cost of using treated carbide falls upon the revenue account, and is much more noticeable than that of a large holder, which is capital expenditure.

From Acetylene, the Principles of Its Generation and Use A Practical Handbook on the Production, Purification, and Subsequent Treatment of Acetylene for the Development of Light, Heat, and Power by F. H. (Frank Henley) Leeds