Learn English – Meaning of the verb “to pooch”

american-englishmeaningverbs

I'm familiar with the word pooch as a cute synonym of doggy, but here is pooch used as a verb:

It was just a poorly done deal and it just so happens to be the biggest deal ever for Nasdaq and they pooched it, that's the bottom line here," said Joe Saluzzi, the co-manager of trading at Themis Trading in Chatham, New Jersey.

Is this a common usage of the word in US English? Or is it just an example of a Wall Street trader abusing our language?

Full article here.

Best Answer

My first thought was that this is probably a shortening of the phrase to screw the pooch.

(idiomatic) to screw up; to fail in dramatic and ignominious fashion

But Wiktionary also has a listing for pooched as an adjective, with no mention of the longer phrase:

(slang) made unusable; broken; buggered (British)

I would say this is not a common use of the word in US English, but that most American readers would get the meaning here.

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