hold-up

noun

Etymology: A deverbal from hold up.

1. A delay or wait.

   “What is the hold-up?”

   “The crossing caused serious congestion with long traffic hold-ups, and had been a bone of contention between the local authorities and the railway for over eighty years. It was controlled from Fletton Road Junction Signalbox (removed at the same time) and, until a wheel was installed in 1920, required two gatemen on each turn of duty.”

2. A robbery at gunpoint.

   “This is a hold-up! Give us all your money.”

   “They didn't get shot to death in hold-ups, strangled to death in rapes, stabbed to death in saloons, bludgeoned to death with axes by parents or children or die summarily by some other act of God.”

3. The holding back of a card that could win a trick in order to use it later.

   “This was another hand on which a holdup caused declarer to lose control and to go down in a sensational way: […]”

   “In a holdup, a player delays taking a trick until opponents' entries are reduced.”

4. Women's stockings designed to be worn without suspenders.
5. The inventory of nuclear material within a separation plant.

   “And to the left is a portable gamma counter that tells us the holdup of plutonium recovery facilities.”

   “During process operations and temporary shutdown, the holdup within the facility is also known as the in-process inventory.”

6. A traffic jam.