tail swallowing
n.— «More than two million HBOS shareholders will soon have to make a decision about whether they might be throwing good money after bad if they subscribe to the bank’s £4bn rights issue.…If you do not have enough money to subscribe to the rights issue, you are basically confined to either selling the rights yourself or having the company do so. However, you could sell enough of your nil paid rights to pay for the rights on the remaining allocation in a process known as “tail swallowing.” Tail swallowing allows you to take up a proportion of the rights, but without putting any extra cash in.» —“Millions of investors must decide soon over HBOS, RBS and B&B rights issues” by Myra Butterworth Telegraph (United Kingdom) May 13, 2008. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
“What has a head like a cat, feet like a cat, a tail like a cat, but isn’t a cat?” Answer: a kitten! A 1948 children’s joke book has lots of these to share with kids. Plus: an easy explanation for the difference between...
When you had sleepovers as a child, what did you call the makeshift beds you made on the floor? In some places, you call those bedclothes and blankets a pallet. This word comes from an old term for “straw.” And: What’s the story...