horse trade
noun
a shrewdly conducted exchange, as of favors or objects, usually resulting from or accompanied by very close bargaining.
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horse trade
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horse-trade
horse-tradeverb (used without object)to bargain or trade shrewdly.
horse trade
1 Americannoun
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a shrewdly conducted exchange, as of favors or objects, usually resulting from or accompanied by very close bargaining.
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an exchanging or trading of horses.
horse-trade
2
American
[hawrs-treyd]
/ ˈhɔrsˌtreɪd /
verb (used without object)
horse-traded,
horse-trading
Etymology
Origin of horse trade1
An Americanism dating back to 1840–50
Origin of horse-trade2
An Americanism dating back to 1820–30
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.
See Examples For:
“A Rocky Mountain trade chain had carried horses to the Northwestern Plains by the 1730s. … The horse trade ignited a technological revolution that reconfigured several Indigenous worlds within a generation.”
From Science Magazine ● Mar. 29, 2023
The researchers saw the robustness of the bones decline in the early 16th century, which would coincide with a decline in the British horse trade.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 14, 2022
Some of the most heavily fished species are classified as threatened with extinction, but the sea horse trade, like everything else I’d seen in this market, is legal.
From Slate ● Nov. 9, 2018
The horse trade has its ups and downs – as I write this, it’s down, the worst in my lifetime.
From The Guardian ● Jun. 8, 2018
The amount of it is, if I don't get stuck by Sam Tucker in a horse trade, Fate sticks me in something bigger.
From 'Doc.' Gordon by Frank T. (Frank Thayer) Merrill
But he offered himself as a rising young protégé, and they taught him how to pass and block legislation, stage filibusters, build coalitions and horse-trade behind the scenes.
From New York Times ● Apr. 23, 2022
Illustrating the horse-trade underway, a board presentation mentioned that $260 million will “be reimbursed to Sound Transit” as credits for transit to use state right of way, and for fish passage improvements.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 28, 2022
All were Democratic presidents who knew how to wheedle, bargain, glad-hand, joke, rib and horse-trade.
From US News ● Aug. 8, 2016
He could wear you down with logic and argument, he could horse-trade and he could flatter.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 10, 2014
"No. I know friendship ceases when a horse-trade begins; but I am only taking you at your word."
From Partners of Chance by Henry Herbert Knibbs
He stopped his tour, tracked down the performer, horse-traded one of his kites for a glider, and took it back to the United States.
From The New Yorker ● Sep. 13, 2019
Others horse-traded with friends who have HBO: I’ll cook dinner if I can watch at your place.
From New York Times ● Apr. 13, 2010
It didn’t feel like there was horse-trading here.
From Slate ● Feb. 20, 2026
In any case he will have to do more horse-trading with allies than has been his style thus far.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 26, 2025
He firmly rejected suggestions of the Open's potential return to Turnberry being part of any horse-trading at a time of trade talks between the US and UK.
From BBC ● Jul. 30, 2025
But what no one noticed amid the horse-trading was that Roberts had laid a slow-motion trap.
From Salon ● Aug. 30, 2024
The former make an open business of horse-trading, and the latter of public-dancing, singing, and fortune-telling.
From Due North or Glimpses of Scandinavia and Russia by Maturin Murray Ballou
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.
