Meaning & use
overlevered
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Meaning
adjectivenot comparablefinancebusiness
Having more debt than is safe or manageable relative to income or assets.
Grammar: Used mainly before a noun or after a linking verb: an overlevered company; the company is overlevered.
Patterns
- an overlevered company
- be overlevered
The bank refused to lend more to the overlevered retailer.
After the takeover, the firm was dangerously overlevered and struggled to pay interest.
Analysts warned that many overlevered households could default if interest rates rose.
Common combinations
- highly overlevered
- The highly overlevered airline needed a government bailout.
- become overlevered
- The company became overlevered after taking on too many loans.
- overlevered balance sheet
- Investors avoided the firm because of its overlevered balance sheet.
Synonyms and how they differ
- debt-ridden
- Debt-ridden is a more general and emphatic term used in everyday writing; overlevered is the precise financial term.
- highly indebted
- Highly indebted means owing a lot of money but does not necessarily imply the debt is excessive relative to assets; overlevered does.
Opposites
Word family
- leverage noun
- The use of borrowed money to increase potential returns.
- leveraged adjective
- Using borrowed money to finance an investment or purchase.
Practice
Which sentence uses 'overlevered' correctly?
Choose one answer.
Overlevered means having too much debt. Option B fits because it mentions huge loans that cannot be repaid. Option An is wrong because too much cash is the opposite of being overlevered. Option C uses overlevered as a verb, but it is an adjective. Option D contradicts the meaning of the word.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “overlevered”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.