banks

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of bank.

   Several regional banks failed during the financial crisis.

   Willow trees lined both banks of the slow canal.

   Note

   Only the countable meanings take this plural: lending institutions and their branch offices, the dealer's fund in a card game, a joint stock of capital. The slang use of bank for money or profit is uncountable, so it has no plural. In that sense, cash is always bank, never banks. Where the word means money, keep it singular.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of bank.

   The aircraft banks steeply as it lines up with the runway.

   He banks the spare cash at the end of each month.

   Note

   The same -s form serves verbs that work with or without an object. With none, the subject does the leaning or the dealing: the plane banks into the turn, she banks with a local lender. Add an object and the subject acts on something else: the pilot banks the aircraft, he banks his savings. What follows the verb usually settles which reading is meant.

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