Coupon

How to spell coupon

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce coupon

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does coupon mean?

1. nounA printed or digital voucher that entitles the holder to a discount, refund, or free item.
2. nounThe interest payment made on a bond, or the detachable slip once used to claim it.

Coupon in a sentence

• She clipped a coupon from the newspaper to save on groceries.

• The bond pays a fixed coupon twice a year until it matures.

• The cashier scanned a coupon that knocked ten percent off the bill.

• Investors compared the coupon rate against current market yields.

Where does coupon come from?

Language of origin: French

Coupon comes directly from the French word coupon, meaning 'a piece cut off', which was built on the verb couper, 'to cut', itself from coup, 'a blow or stroke'. In nineteenth-century finance, bonds were issued with small detachable slips around their edge, and the holder literally cut one off and presented it to claim each interest payment, so the slip itself became known as the coupon. English borrowed the word in the early 1800s and kept the French spelling intact, which is exactly why the silent-looking 'ou' and the single 'p' trip people up. The sense soon broadened from financial slips to any detachable voucher offering a discount, a free gift, or entry to something. The same couper root sits behind the everyday word 'coup', a sudden cutting stroke, and behind 'coupe', a car whose roofline looks cut short.

How the word is built

• coup- (from French couper, to cut)
• -on (noun-forming suffix); literally a small piece cut off