This has two meanings.
- The classic meaning in economics is to allow inflation to effectively eliminate or drastically reduce the real value of a debt, in particular where a government prints money to inflate its currency, lowering the absolute value of the parts of the national debt denominated in the home currency.
- Alternately, it is sometimes used as a way of describing converting or extracting revenue and value from intangible assets, especially patents, usually by seeking royalty-paying licensees.