go south

and head South

1. Sl. to make an escape; to disappear. (Not necessarily in a southerly direction.) Lefty went South the minute he got out of the pen. The mugger headed South just after the crime.

2. Sl. to fall; to go down. (Securities markets.) All the stock market indexes went South today. The market headed South today at the opening bell

3. Sl. to quit; to drop out of sight. Fred got discouraged and went South. I think he gave up football permanently. After pulling the bank job, Wilbur went South for a few months.

See also: south

go south

1. to lose value or quality She decided to sell her stocks at the end of the year because she felt the market was going south.

2. to stop working Ralph was on a business trip to New York when his laptop computer went south.

See also: south

go south

(American informal)

to lose value or quality When oil prices went south, it caused problems right across the economy. She played well in the tennis championships, except her serve seemed to have gone south.

See also: south

go south

Deteriorate or decline, as in The stock market is headed south again. This expression is generally thought to allude to compasses and two-dimensional maps where north is up and south is down. However, among some Native Americans, the term was a euphemism for dying, and possibly this sense led to the present usage. [Slang; first half of 1900s] Also see go west.

See also: south

go South

and head South

1. in. to fall; to go down. (Securities markets. This is a way of saying down. South is usually “down” on a map.) The market headed South today at the opening bell.

2. in. to quit; to drop out of sight. After pulling the bank job, Shorty went South for a few months.

3. in. to make an escape; to disappear. The mugger went South just after the crime.

See also: south

Common Names:

Name	Pronounced	Usage
Lorencio	lo-REN-thyo (Spanish), lo-REN-syo (Latin American Spanish)	Medieval Spanish
Artemisia	-	Ancient Greek
Esma	-	Turkish, Bosnian
Sue	SOO	English
Devine	[də'vain]
Kadek	-	Indonesian, Balinese