Funds

How to spell funds

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce funds

What does funds mean?

1. nounMoney that is available to be spent, especially a sum set aside for a particular purpose.

Funds in a sentence

• The charity raised enough funds to rebuild the playground.

• The project stalled because the council ran out of funds.

Where does funds come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word traces back to the Latin fundus, which literally meant 'the bottom' or 'base' of something, and by extension a piece of landed property or an estate that formed the foundation of a person's wealth. The same root gives us 'foundation', 'profound', and 'founder', all carrying that core idea of a base or bottom. English borrowed 'fund' through French in the 1600s, first in the sense of a 'bottom' or stock that could be drawn upon, and the financial meaning soon settled: a reserve of money set aside for a purpose. The plural 'funds', meaning available money or resources, became common in the eighteenth century, especially in connection with government securities and public finance. Because the word is fully anglicised, its spelling is regular and predictable, with the only point to remember being the simple addition of a plain -s.

How the word is built

• fund (from Latin fundus: bottom, base, landed estate)
• -s (plural)