disintermediation

noun

The removal of funds from a financial institution such as a bank for direct purchase of financial instruments.

“The news industry is undergoing a massive disintermediation due to the ubiquitous low-cost communication made possible by the internet.”

UncommonScrabble 21

Meanings

noundisintermediation (countable and uncountable, plural disintermediations)

plural disintermediations

  1. countableuncountablebankingThe removal of funds from a financial institution such as a bank for direct purchase of financial instruments.

    Any disintermediation crisis, such as has occurred three times since 1966, causes mortgage money to dry up and slow down new housing construction which the country desperately needs.

    1974 July 18, “Disintermediation”, in The New York Times, →ISSN
  2. countableuncountablebusinessThe removal of an intermediary from a commercial transaction.

    The news industry is undergoing a massive disintermediation due to the ubiquitous low-cost communication made possible by the internet.

    2 more examples

    New-media thinkers, with their appetite for disintermediation and creative destruction, implicitly endorse and advance this transformation.

    2014, Astra Taylor, chapter 2, in The People's Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age, Henry Holt and Company, →ISBN

    The logic of disintermediation seems self-evident: By putting factories directly in contact with stores, by helping customers order directly from manufacturers, by letting riders coordinate with drivers, you cut out a needless source of waste and inefficiency.

    2017 August 15, Charles Duhigg, “The Rise of the Fidget Spinner and the Fall of the Well-Managed Fad”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

Origin

  1. Proto-Indo-European*dwóh₁
  2. Proto-Indo-European*trísinflu.
  3. Proto-Indo-European*d(w)is-
  4. Proto-Italic*dis-
  5. Latindis-
  6. Old Frenchdes-
  7. Latindis-
  8. Middle Englishdis-
  9. Englishdis-
  10. Englishintermediate
  11. Englishintermediation
  12. Englishdisintermediation

From dis- + intermediation.

Full word history & related roots →

Translations

Polish dezintermediacja
  • dezintermediacjaTranslations
Cite this entry
APA

disintermediation. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/disintermediation

MLA

“disintermediation.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/disintermediation. Accessed November 2, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “disintermediation,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/disintermediation.

Source: disintermediation on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.