noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of creditor
1400–50; late Middle English creditour < Latin crēditor, equivalent to crēdi- variant stem of crēdere to believe, entrust ( see credit) + -tor -tor
Explanation
If Joe loans you two dollars so you can buy a cup of coffee, Joe is your creditor — you owe him two dollars and a big thank you! If you have a credit card, the bank that issues it to you is your creditor. What they give you is not just a piece of plastic: rather it is a line of credit or a certain amount of money that they have agreed to loan you at fixed terms. Make sure you pay it off every month or you'll become a debtor!
Vocabulary lists containing creditor
Believe It or Not: Cred
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Personal Finance and Financial Literacy - Introductory
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cred
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
She wrote a letter to a Japanese government-backed creditor called Japan Australia Rare Earths saying that she would be arriving in Tokyo, figuring that Japanese politeness meant that representatives would meet her.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 18, 2026
She recalls traveling on a tight budget and staying in a tiny Holiday Inn Express room in Hong Kong—where one creditor was based—that was so cramped she struggled to open her suitcase.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 18, 2026
The leverage the city has on the pending sale includes its status as a creditor seeking to recoup public funds spent to protect the complex with fencing and deploy police security to prevent vandalism.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 28, 2026
The strength of this creditor protection depends on how the trust is drafted.
From MarketWatch ● May 23, 2026
The salesman had told Hale that because he wasn’t Roan’s relative, he could become his beneficiary only if he were his creditor.
From "Killers of the Flower Moon" by David Grann
Valentine Nesbit “tabulated the expenses” of debtors who appeared in his court in the 1930s, “subtracted them from the debtor’s wages,” and paid the rest to creditors.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 27, 2026
So if you’re a graduate who’s struggling to make your monthly payments on a large student-loan balance, then bankruptcy may not offer as clear a path to financial redemption as directly negotiating with your creditors.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 10, 2026
The judge, Mr Justice Hildyard, had to decide if the restructuring was fair – whether creditors would be no worse off under than plan than if the retailer were to go into administration.
From BBC ● Jul. 1, 2026
From my understanding, I enroll with a company and they negotiate with all my creditors, while I just don’t pay the credit cards and let my credit take a hopefully short-term hit.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 30, 2026
When creditors came by demanding to see the owner of the building, Holmes referred them happily to the fictive H. S. Campbell.
From "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
