bezzle

bezzle verb: to plunder; to lay waste to, in riot.

Verb

bezzle (third-person singular simple present bezzles, present participle bezzling, simple past and past participle bezzled)

bezzle (plural bezzles)

The level or proportion of financial sector activity that consists of hidden embezzlement, varying in step with the business cycle.
The time between when a confidence trickster has stolen money from an unsuspecting person and when that person realizes the money has been stolen.
- That word is bezzle. It describes the period in which an embezzler has stolen a man's money but the victim does not yet realize he's been swindled.2015 December 3, Tracy Alloway, “There's Been a Bezzle-Fueled Boom in Bonds”, in Markets, Bloomberg News, retrieved 16 Aug 2021
- Uber is a bezzle ("the magic interval when a confidence trickster knows he has the money he has appropriated but the victim does not yet understand that he has lost it"). Every bezzle ends.2021 August 10, Cory Doctorow, “End of the Line for Uber”, in Pluralistic, Cory Doctorow, retrieved 16 Aug 2021
The difference between the short-term or current market value of an asset and its true long-term worth.

Verb
third-person singular present	bezzles
present participle	bezzling
past participle	bezzled
past	bezzled
Noun
plural	bezzles

From Middle English besilen, from Old French besiler, besillier (“to mistreat, pillage”); or shortened from English embezzle.

Coined by John Kenneth Galbraith, from embezzle.

What does bezzle mean?: Bezzle means to plunder; to lay waste to, in riot.
What part of speech is bezzle?: Bezzle can be a verb or a noun.
What is the past tense of bezzle?: The past tense of bezzle is bezzled.

Adapted from Wiktionary: bezzle (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Cite this entry: “bezzle.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bezzle. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.