bucket shop
Americannoun
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Stock Exchange. an unsound, unethical, or overly aggressive brokerage house.
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Slang. any shady commercial agency, as one dealing in illegally priced theater tickets.
noun
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an unregistered firm of stockbrokers that engages in speculation with clients' funds
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any small business that cannot be relied upon, esp one selling cheap airline tickets
Etymology
Origin of bucket shop
An Americanism dating back to 1870–75; originally a cheap drinking establishment, allegedly so called because liquor was mixed or sold in buckets
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The subsequent investigation under New York’s Martin Act brought down the Consolidated, and helped end the heyday of the bucket shop.
From Barron's ● Apr. 7, 2026
From the outside, a bucket shop resembled a legitimate brokerage.
From Barron's ● Apr. 7, 2026
Pressler sat on the board of Sky Capital LLC, a defunct bucket shop run by the fraudster, Ross Mandell.
From New York Times ● Oct. 13, 2014
Ryanair, the "no frills" bucket shop airline, has finally confirmed that passengers will now be charged to use the loo.
From The Guardian ● Apr. 10, 2010
It made Rockefeller's little kerosene speculation look like a bucket shop.
From The Gentle Grafter by Greening, H. C.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
