Other forms: diversified, diversifying, diversifies
To diversify is to spread into a wider range of kinds. Diversify the portfolio, diversify the economy, diversify away from oil.
In investing it is the one free lunch: spreading money across things that do not move together reduces risk without reducing expected return, which is as close to a rule as finance gets. Economies that fail to diversify are hostage to one price. Note diverse; and that the Latin means turned different ways.
1verbdiversifyTo spread into a wider range of kinds.
“The farm decided to diversify, adding a café and a campsite to its fields.”
diversify is a spreading out.
Middle French diversifier comes from Latin diversus, turned different ways, from divertere. Divert and diverse come from the same turning.
Middle French
diversifier
English, today
diversify
Middle French diversifier, equivalent to diverse + -ify.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA