traffics

1. 1
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of traffic.

   He traffics in cheap imports, reselling them at a steep markup.

   The ring traffics stolen cars across the border.

   Note

   The verb form that needs no extra letter. The -s attaches directly, while trafficking and trafficked insert a k to keep the hard sound. Used intransitively it usually takes in (he traffics in cheap imports), and it can carry a disapproving edge, since the verb also means to trade meanly or for mercenary ends. Used transitively, it means to exchange something by bargain or for a consideration.

2. 2
   noun

   Plural of traffic. Rare, since traffic is usually uncountable.

   Note

   A plural that only makes sense once traffic stops being a mass. Nearly every meaning of the base noun is usually uncountable: vehicles on a road, goods in trade, data on a network. So the plural names separate streams or kinds rather than individual items, as in the distinct traffics of a network or a port. In ordinary prose the singular traffic is the safer, more natural choice.

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