Bankrupt means legally unable to pay your debts — the money is gone. Go bankrupt, declared bankrupt, morally bankrupt.
Strictly the word applies to a person, and a company that fails is insolvent or in liquidation, though everyday speech ignores the distinction. Bankruptcy discharges most debts after a period, which exists so that failure need not be permanent. The Italian means a broken bench.
1adjectivebankruptLegally unable to pay your debts.
“The company went bankrupt after losing its biggest customer.”
bankrupt is a legal state.
Also accepted in games: broke, insolvent
Italian banca rotta means a broken bench, from the bench a moneylender worked at, broken when the business failed.
Proto-Indo-European
*Hrewp-
English, today
bankrupt
Built from
bancarotta, from banca (“bank”) literally “bench” + rotto (“broken, rupted”), which refers to an out-of-business bank, having its bench physically broken, signifying that the working moneylender was insolvent.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA