Speculating

How to spell speculating

11 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce speculating

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does speculating mean?

1. verbForming theories or guesses about something without firm evidence.
2. verbBuying or trading assets in the hope of profit, accepting a high risk of loss.

Speculating in a sentence

• The analysts kept speculating about why the company missed its targets.

• He lost his savings speculating on volatile cryptocurrency markets.

• Reporters were speculating about who would be named the next chief executive.

• The fund made its fortune by speculating in undervalued property.

Where does speculating come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin verb speculari, which meant 'to watch, observe, or spy out', and that in turn was built on specula, a 'watchtower', the lofty place from which a lookout scanned the horizon. At the root of all of these sits the Latin verb specere, simply 'to look', a root that also gives us 'spectacle', 'inspect', and 'aspect'. When English adopted 'speculate' in the late 1500s it kept the idea of looking carefully, but applied it to the mind: to look at a question from every angle and form theories about it. By the 1700s the word had also taken on its commercial sense, where an investor 'looks ahead' at risky ventures in the hope of profit. The spelling preserves that hidden 'specere' family, so remembering the link to 'spectacle' helps fix the -spec- opening and the easily slurred -ula- in the middle.

How the word is built

• spec- (from specere: to look, watch)
• -ul- (diminutive/instrumental)
• -ate (verb)
• -ing (present participle)