回扣
huí koù · HSK 7
a kickback
💰🔙 回 = return/back + 扣 = deduct/withhold; money quietly deducted and returned to the middleman
回 means return or back, 扣 means to deduct or withhold. A 回扣 is a slice deducted from a deal and handed back to the broker who arranged it, hence brokerage, commission, or a polite word for a bribe.
回 — enclosure 囗 + smaller 囗 inside
回 is a pictograph of a swirling whirlpool or coiled spiral, shown as nested squares in modern form. The original meaning was 'to revolve' or 'turn around,' which extended to 'return' and 'a time/occurrence.' It also appears as a phonetic in characters like 茴 and 廻.
扣 — hand radical 扌 + 口 (mouth/phonetic)
扣 is a phono-semantic compound: the hand radical 扌 signals an action done with the hand, while 口 (kǒu) supplies the sound. Its core sense is to knock, fasten, or buckle with the hand, later extending to deduct (as in deducting points) and to button up.