# speculant
## English
### Noun

speculant (plural speculants)
* A speculator; one who makes speculative (high-risk) investments.
** 1935, Monthly Review, page 306:They moreover also belonged to those securities which speculants neglected at the beginning, which is perhaps sufficiently explained by the position of the rubber market and by the rubber price.
** 1994, The European Monetary System During the Phase of Transition to European Monetary Union: Future Scenarios and Various Reform Options, page 85:The thereby reduced inter currency interest rate in favour of the attacked currency decreases the financing costs of the speculants and, therefore, further increases the incentive to speculate.
** 2001, Swami Agnivesh, “Striving for a Truly Spiritual Culture”, in Joseph A. Camilleri, editor, Religion and culture in Asia Pacific: Violence or Healing?, Vista Publications, →ISBN, page 137:How much further do we plan to bow to the gurus of Wall Street, to the speculants in Tokyo and London?
** 2014, Peter Leoni, The Greeks and Hedging Explained:A third example would be a speculant that enters into the market purely on a direction view.
* A profiteer or illegal trader.
** 1915 September, “The Situation in Palestine”, in The Maccabæan: A Magazine of Jewish Life and Letters, volume 27, number 3, page 78:In this way the danger threatening the population from unscrupulous speculants was averted and the prices were kept down.
** 1994, Anders Johansson, Emancipation and Interdependence, page 163:There were many agents among the Russian speculants.
** 2019, Alina-Sandra Cucu, Planning Labour: Time and the Foundations of Industrial Socialism in Romania (International Studies in Social History; volume 32), Berghahn Books, →ISBN:For instance, on 6 July 1945, authorities stated that the saboteurs and the speculants ‘will be hit without mercy’.
* One who thinks about speculative subjects; one who dreams, extrapolates, or conjectures.
** 1882 January 11, T. Jones, “Economy in Cutting”, in The Weekly record of fashion, volume 7, number 316, page 9:To shew that the plan is not the vague dream of a speculant, Mr. Jones sent full-sized patterns pinned on a sheet of paper cut exactly to the length and width of material stated.
** 1890, Alfred Edersheim, Ella Edersheim, Tohu-Va-Vohu ['Without Form and Void'], page 118:This supposed possibility is straightway converted into an actuality, with no better support than that it has occurred as a possibility to the brain of a speculant.
** 1976, Prix Jeunesse, Fernsehen und Bildung, Television and Socialization Processes in the Family:The "gap in between" is thus often occupied by speculants and speculations which are neither in line with research results nor in line with practical considerations.
** 2018, Amir Levinson, Fireworks in a Dark Universe, World Scientific, page 287:On more abstract levels, scientists are trying to understand the connection between black holes and information theory and holography, and speculants are investigating whether wormholes can serve as a basis for the construction of time machines and whether the universe in which we live is one of many universes (estimated at 10500) in a multiverse.

### Adjective

speculant (comparative more speculant, superlative most speculant)
* Speculative or hopefully wondering.
** 1843, Bernard M- (of S-), A Dream of a Queen's Reign., page 1:I essayed to arise out of my chair, that I might render a beseeming homage unto so excellent a presence but was prevented; amazement having fixed me agaze and half risen, as a statue of wonder; leaving to mine eyes only the power of a speculant admiration.
** 1907, John Halsham, Lonewood Corner: A Countryman's Horizons, page 13:In the new order of things—four years still leaves it new to a slow-moulded temperament—a feeling of detachment which is an old failing grows stronger, a sense of walking about among my kind, speculant, aloof.
** 1984, Emily Grosholz, The River Painter: Poems:Banks stocked with fishers are richer in dreams than signs of fish; the lines lead under uncircled surfaces sharp into fathoms of speculant green.

## Dutch
### Etymology

From speculeren +‎ -ant.

### Pronunciation

* Audio:(file)
* Hyphenation: spe‧cu‧lant

### Noun

speculant m (plural speculanten, diminutive speculantje n)
* speculator

#### Related terms

* speculatie

#### Descendants

* → Indonesian: spekulan

## Romanian
### Etymology

Borrowed from German Spekulant.

### Noun

speculant m (plural speculanți)
* speculator