Capitalised

Capitalised is the British English spelling of the past participle and adjective form of the verb capitalise. It generally denotes that something has been provided with capital or, in orthography, that text has been written with capital letters. The American English equivalent is capitalized, and the related noun forms are capitalisation (British) and capitalization (American).

In orthography, capitalisation refers to the practice of using upper-case letters. Capital letters are typically applied to the initial letter of a sentence, to proper nouns (such as people, places, organisations), and to certain stylistic choices dictated by a style guide. Rules for capitalising other words differ by language and by style, and in titles many guides use either title case or sentence case. The term capitalised describes text that has undergone this process.

In finance and accounting, capitalisation has at least two distinct meanings. To capitalise a cost means to record it as an asset on the balance sheet rather than expensing it immediately, spreading the cost over the asset’s useful life through depreciation or amortisation. This applies to capital purchases such as property, plant and equipment, or software development costs that meet recognition criteria. Capitalisation can also refer to market capitalisation (capitalization): the total market value of a company’s outstanding shares, a measure used to assess company size.

As a verb, capitalise or capitalised can also mean to take advantage of a situation, as in capitalising on rising demand. The term’s precise meaning depends on context, spanning orthography, accounting, finance, and general usage.