DEFALCATION

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does defalcation mean? 

• DEFALCATION (noun)
  The noun DEFALCATION has 2 senses:

1. the sum of money that is misappropriated

2. the fraudulent appropriation of funds or property entrusted to your care but actually owned by someone else

  Familiarity information: DEFALCATION used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• DEFALCATION (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The sum of money that is misappropriated

Classified under:

Nouns denoting possession and transfer of possession

Hypernyms ("defalcation" is a kind of...):

amount; amount of money; sum; sum of money (a quantity of money)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The fraudulent appropriation of funds or property entrusted to your care but actually owned by someone else

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

defalcation; embezzlement; misapplication; misappropriation; peculation

Hypernyms ("defalcation" is a kind of...):

larceny; stealing; theft; thievery; thieving (the act of taking something from someone unlawfully)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "defalcation"):

raid (an attempt by speculators to defraud investors)

plunderage (the act of plundering (especially the embezzlement of goods on shipboard))

Derivation:

defalcate (appropriate (as property entrusted to one's care) fraudulently to one's own use)

 Context examples 

Having counted our funds, and reduced to order a great mass of unintentional confusion in the first place, and of wilful confusion and falsification in the second, we take it to be clear that Mr. Wickfield might now wind up his business, and his agency-trust, and exhibit no deficiency or defalcation whatever.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)