Jump To:

• black market
  black market

  noun

  the illicit buying and selling of goods in violation of legal price controls, rationing, etc.
• black-market
  black-market

  verb (used without object)

  to black-marketeer.

black market

¹ American  

noun

black markets plural

1. the illicit buying and selling of goods in violation of legal price controls, rationing, etc.

2. a place where such activity is carried on.

---

black-market ² American  

[blak-mahr-kit] / ˈblækˈmɑr kɪt /

verb (used without object)

1. to black-marketeer.

---

verb (used with object)

1. to sell (something) in the black market.

black market British  

noun

1. 1. any system in which goods or currencies are sold and bought illegally, esp in violation of controls or rationing

   2. ( as modifier )

      black market lamb

2. the place where such a system operates

---

verb

1. to sell (goods) on the black market

black market Cultural  

1. The illegal buying and selling of goods above the price fixed by a government. Black markets usually develop when, because of war, disaster, or public policy, a government tries to set prices for commodities instead of allowing the normal operations of supply and demand to set prices.

---

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• black marketeer
  noun

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• black markets
  plural

Etymology

Origin of black market¹

First recorded in 1930–35

Origin of black-market²

First recorded in 1930–35; v. use of black market

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

black market black-market

She added that stakeholders had expressed concerns that more regulation could push problem gamblers onto the black market.

From BBC ● Jul. 7, 2026

In an April social media post, Kennedy criticized the FDA’s failure to approve more peptides—for “driving a dangerous black market that puts Americans at risk.”

From Barron's ● Jun. 16, 2026

Van Zeller, 50, has won dozens of awards for the program that has taken her around the world to report on black market activities and human trafficking.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 11, 2026

Romanée-Conti’s high demand and hefty price has also motivated thieves and counterfeiters, helping to foster a black market for rare spirits, where shady dealers and covetous buyers are willing to ignore a bottle’s provenance.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 31, 2026

He must have come by this in the same way he came by the magazines, not honestly: it reeks of black market.

From "The Handmaid's Tale" by Margaret Atwood

Holocaust Memorial Museum describes the program as a coordinated effort to strip communities of cultural identity while redistributing art through state and black-market channels.

From Salon ● May 9, 2026

Nearly all of the country’s paltry output in recent years had ultimately flowed there in largely black-market purchases, at a steep discount to global prices.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 24, 2026

The rial was depreciating again on Monday against the greenback after strengthening in recent days, according to the informal black-market rate, which stands at around 1.4 million rials, compared with about 770,000 a year earlier.

From Barron's ● Jan. 5, 2026

But evidence in three London house-share hotspots we examined suggests that in some places there are more unlicensed, black-market HMOs than there are legal ones.

From BBC ● Aug. 1, 2025

About seven months earlier, I’d obtained a set of IOI intranet passwords from the L33t HaxOrz Warezhaus, the same black-market data auction site where I’d purchased the information needed to create a new identity.

From "Ready Player One: A Novel" by Ernest Cline