Deleveraging

The reduction of debt relative to income or assets, at a company, a sector or an economy.

At the corporate level it happens through repayment or asset sales, or through equity issuance. Which route it takes tells you a great deal about the board's confidence.

At the economy level it's slow and painful, because one entity repaying debt reduces another's income. Coordinated deleveraging produces recessions for that reason.

India's corporate sector spent much of the last decade doing this after an investment boom, and the recovery in returns on capital that followed is the visible result.