hedge Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun a fence formed by a row of closely planted shrubs or bushes
    hedgerow.
  2. noun any technique designed to reduce or eliminate financial risk; for example, taking two positions that will offset each other if prices change
    hedging.
  3. noun an intentionally noncommittal or ambiguous statement
    hedging.
    • when you say `maybe' you are just hedging
  4. verb avoid or try to avoid fulfilling, answering, or performing (duties, questions, or issues)
    dodge; fudge; sidestep; evade; parry; elude; skirt; duck; circumvent; put off.
    • He dodged the issue
    • she skirted the problem
    • They tend to evade their responsibilities
    • he evaded the questions skillfully
  5. verb hinder or restrict with or as if with a hedge
    • The animals were hedged in
  6. verb enclose or bound in with or as it with a hedge or hedges
    hedge in.
    • hedge the property
  7. verb minimize loss or risk
    • diversify your financial portfolio to hedge price risks
    • hedge your bets

WordNet


Hedge noun
Etymology
OE. hegge, AS. hecg; akin to haga an inclosure, E. haw, AS. hege hedge, E. haybote, D. hegge, OHG. hegga, G. hecke. See Haw a hedge.
Definitions
  1. A thicket of bushes, usually thorn bushes; especially, such a thicket planted as a fence between any two portions of land; and also any sort of shrubbery, as evergreens, planted in a line or as a fence; particularly, such a thicket planted round a field to fence it, or in rows to separate the parts of a garden.
    The roughest berry on the rudest hedge. Shak.
    Through the verdant maze Of sweetbrier hedges I pursue my walk. Thomson.
    Hedge, when used adjectively or in composition, often means rustic, outlandish, illiterate, poor, or mean; as, hedge priest; hedgeborn, etc. Pepys.
Hedge transitive verb
Wordforms
imperfect & past participle Hedged ; present participle & verbal noun Hedging
Definitions
  1. To inclose or separate with a hedge; to fence with a thickly set line or thicket of shrubs or small trees; as, to hedge a field or garden.
  2. To obstruct, as a road, with a barrier; to hinder from progress or success; -- sometimes with up and out.
    I will hedge up thy way with thorns. Hos. ii. 6.
    Lollius Urbius . . . drew another wall . . . to hedge out incursions from the north. Milton.
  3. To surround for defense; to guard; to protect; to hem (in). "England, hedged in with the main." Shak.
  4. To surround so as to prevent escape.
    That is a law to hedge in the cuckoo. Locke.
Hedge intransitive verb
Definitions
  1. To shelter one's self from danger, risk, duty, responsibility, etc., as if by hiding in or behind a hedge; to skulk; to slink; to shirk obligations.
    I myself sometimes, leaving the fear of God on the left hand and hiding mine honor in my necessity, am fain to shuffle, to hedge and to lurch. Shak.
  2. (Betting) To reduce the risk of a wager by making a bet against the side or chance one has bet on.
  3. To use reservations and qualifications in one's speech so as to avoid committing one's self to anything definite.
    The Heroic Stanzas read much more like an elaborate attempt to hedge between the parties than . . . to gain favor from the Roundheads. Saintsbury.

Webster 1913