Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US) $1, $10.

[1779		document in S.P. Hildreth Pioneer Hist. (1848) 138: I do certify, that I am indebted to the bearer, Captain Johnny, seven bucks and one doe, for the use of the states, this 19th April, 1779. Signed, Samuel Sample, assistant quartermaster].
[1851		H. Howe Historical Colls. of Ohio 274: A muskrat skin was equal to a quarter of a dollar; a racoon skin, a third of a dollar; a doe skin, half a dollar, and a buck skin, ‘the almighty dollar.’].
1856		Dem. State Journal 3 July 3/2: Bernard [...] mulcted in the sum of twenty bucks [DA].
1873		J. O’Connor Wanderings of a Vagabond 36: When I beat that ace full for him I captured sixty good bucks from him on that hand.
1898		F.P. Dunne Mr Dooley in Peace and War 177: Man alive, don’t you know what a dollar is? Carlisle’d hand him out a plunk, a case, a buck.
1905		H. Green Actors’ Boarding House (1906) 26: Kin you lemme take a couple o’ bucks till Satiddy?
1917		G. Bowerman diary 6 Mar. in Carnes Compensations of War (1983) 18: We receive our pay 184 francs for a ‘buck’.
1924		E. Pound letter 30 Nov. in Paige (1971) 190: The book, of course, can’t be made for 25 bucks.
1928		R. Fisher Walls Of Jericho 217: Go to one of these drugstores that [...] could sell you the best rye right off at five or six bucks a pint.
1932		R. Fisher Conjure-Man Dies 241: He’s got eighty bucks o’ my buddy’s dough.
1947		T. Thursday ‘Billy the Kidder’ in Blue Ribbon Western Nov. 🌐 I will personally add ten buckaroos to the reward.
1957		Kerouac On The Road (1972) 21: I decided to spend a buck on beer.
1957		C. Himes Imabelle 5: ‘That’s right,’ Jackson said. ‘Fifteen hundred bucks’.
1965		C. Himes Rage in Harlem (1969) 7: [as 1957].
1976		J. Heller Good As Gold (1979) 309: I could probably pull out now with over a million bucks clear.
1989		C. Hiaasen Skin Tight 43: We gave her six hundred bucks … and never saw her again.
1990		S. Morgan Homeboy 10: Not only couldn’t you shake down a couple of bucks.
2000		M. Collins Keepers of Truth 127: Sure that’s a good couch, but you paid forty bucks in nineteen fifty-two for it, Pa.
2010		(con. 1973) C. Stella Johnny Porno 32: You gonna parlay the few bucks you have phoning bets in?

2. sixpence, usu. preceded by a number of shillings, e.g. six and a buck, 6s 6d.

1873		Sl. Dict. 99: Buck sixpence. The word is rarely used by itself, but generally denotes the sixpence attached to shillings in reference to cost, as, ‘three and a buck,’ three shillings and sixpence.
1885		Household Words 20 June 155: ‘Buck’ is most likely a corruption of ‘fyebuck,’ a slang name for sixpence, which is now almost, if not altogether, obsolete.
1922		Dundee Eve. Teleg. 19 July 2/4: Sixpence is a popular coin in slangdom [...] ‘bandy’ [...] and ‘downer,’ ‘buck,’ and ‘fye-back’.

3. (US) $100; thus half-buck, $50; buck-and-a-half $150.

1945		L. Hoban ‘Time to Kill’ Crack Detective Jan. 🌐 And here I’ve been selling my services to Jergin for a buck and a half a week.
1965		J. Thompson Texas by the Tail (1994) 139: ‘A couple of bucks will be fine,’ [...] he dropped two hundred dollars on the table.
1972		G.V. Higgins Friends of Eddie Coyle 10: He’d go a buck and a half apiece for as many as I could get.
1974		G. Radano Stories Cops Only Tell Each Other 140: I want a buck and a half for the information.
1992		J. Mowry Way Past Cool 39: Deek would hand the big boy a fifty [...] The dude would have to stick the Sherman in his mouth to pocket the half-buck.
1999		T. Dorsey Florida Roadkill 195: No, man, a buck is a hunded dollars.
2006		G. Pelecanos Night Gardener 43: ‘How much we get?’ [...] ‘Buck forty.’.
2013		T. Dorsey Riptide Ultra-Glide 124: The weed is a buck-twenty for a one-finger bag.

4. (US) money, irrespective of amount (although the image is usu. of quantity).

1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 35/1: Buck, n. 1. [...] 2. A dollar; a tidy sum. (’A nice [or good] buck’—a good income.).
1955		R. Graziano Somebody Up There Likes Me 209: A few more fights and a few more bucks. [Ibid.] 270: We’re going to make a lot of bucks yet.
1974		D. Ireland Burn 133: We make a trip, take a new car south or north or west for delivery, get bucks for that. Pick up a few dollars wherever we are.
1975		D. Goines Inner City Hoodlum 59: I’m jus’ a little guy makin’ a buck.
1983		C. Heath A-Team 2 (1984) 107: If somebody could think of a quick way to make a crooked buck in the Arctic Circle, the mob would be there, ready to take over.
1989		R.G. Barratt ‘Tall Poppies Deserve Short Shrift’ in What Do You Reckon (1997) [ebook] Not that for an instant I’m against making a buck.
1992		J. Mowry Way Past Cool 68: Wayne needin some major bucks for scorin himself a decent gun. [Ibid.] 79: So, magic-boy, you tell me where we gonna score that kind of buck.
1993		G. Disher Deathdeal [ebook] ‘Are you sure you want to do this? I’ [...] ‘There’s a buck in it’.
2006		G. Malkani Londonstani (2007) 140: He should be thinkin how to make some decent bucks a his own.

5. (S.Afr.) a rand.

1975

S.S. Mekgoe Lindiwe (2001) I iii: How much? Hmm! Four thousand bucks?

6. (Aus./N.Z.) A$1.

1977		in K. Gilbert Living Black 224: Anybody with a buck in his pocket he couldn’t care less about.
1982		G. Newbold Big Huey 11: It was just my luck to run into a guy [...] who was prepared to give me ten buddha sticks at a time ‘up front’ and charge me ninety bucks for them later.
1997		L. Davies Candy 196: Let’s say twenty-five bucks for the three packets.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 35: buck [...] 2. A Kiwi dollar, adapted from American dollar.
2007		D. McDonald Luck in the Greater West (2008) 9: For every ounce of pot he sold he made a hundred bucks.
2019		C. Hammer Silver [ebook] ‘Twenty bucks for a year, fifty for three’.

7. 100, in non-monetary contexts.

1990		Orlando Sentinel (FL) 24 Apr. 28/2: ‘I weigh a buck seventy-five [175 pounds]’.
2006		C. Hiaasen Nature Girl 26: ‘How much does she weigh?’ ‘A buck forty.’.
2012		‘Dutch’ ? (Pronounced Que) [ebook] Trello [...] weight a buck-fifty, soaking wet.
2019		D. Winslow Border [ebook] Eighty, ninety, a hundred, they slide into a banked turn and Cirello feels like he’s going to puke. Next lap Eddie kicks it up to a buck twenty.

8. (US black) $100,000.

2007		Young Jeezy ‘White Girl’ 🎵 Last time we came through, we spent about a buck eighty (damn) / ‘About a buck eighty?’ Yeah, a hundred-eighty thousand (yeah!).
2014		J. Bacharach Bend of World 127: The [club] membership had long since declined in aristocratic quality so now any asshole with [...] a buck-fifty paycheck from a bank could join.

9. €1 (one euro).

2013

exberliner.com 2 Aug. 🌐 It’s an extra 150 bucks from the government for keeping your child at home.

10. (UK teen) £1.

2020

G. Armstrong Young Team 7: Our dossin aboot the streets doesnae qualify fur a high quality [...] jakit [...] two hundred and fifty bucks.