EBIT stands for Earnings Before Interest and Tax.

It is a specific term which is essentially the profit of a business before you take into consideration Interest and Tax.

Why would you want to focus on profit without considering Interest and Tax?  Well, often when using a Profit and Loss Statement, we are trying to evaluate how the business is performing, that is, are the people managing the business doing a good job?  Obviously interest, and tax has a bearing on how much money a business makes, but it usually doesn’t have much to do with how well the managers of the business are doing their job.  Interest is the money earned on interest sitting in the bank (which doesn’t require any significant management expertise), and Tax is set buy the government.  So because the performance of the managers of a business often doesn’t have much to do with Interest and Tax, it is useful to know what the business earning (or profit) are without consideration of Interest and Tax, and that’s what the business EBIT is.