From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishparlaypar‧lay /ˈpɑːli $ ˈpɑːrleɪ/ verb [transitive] American EnglishDO WELL to use advantages that you already have, such as your skills, experience, or money, and increase their value by using all your opportunities wellparlay something into something He owned five movie theaters, which he eventually parlayed into hotels.→ See Verb table
Examples from the Corpus
parlay• Workers that have developed unique skills that they parlay into jobs or their own businesses have enjoyed more success.• His major was economics, but there is no record of any attempt to parlay it into a career.• In many states, liberalized workers' compensation programs have permitted unscrupulous employees to parlay minor ailments into early retirements.• He is a moderate who won election and later was able to parlay that experience into national exposure as a Washington outsider.parlay something into something• DeLuca parlayed a $1,000 investment into the nation's largest submarine-sandwich chain.From Longman Business Dictionaryparlaypar‧lay /ˈpɑːliˈpɑːrleɪ/ verb [transitive] American English to increase the value of something you have, especially your abilities, money, or success, by using your opportunities wellparlay something into somethingThe party chairman parlayed his political contacts into a vastly lucrative legal practice.→ See Verb tableOrigin parlay (1800-1900) French paroli (noun), from Italian, from paro “equal”, from Latin par; → PAR 