The term translated as “merchants” simply denotes the persons who organize trade, that is, businessmen. They had been mentioned already in Revelation 18:3 as those who had acquired great wealth because of their complicity (via kings) with the prostitute (any togetherness of people, i.e., civilization, city, state that entices people to find their sense of contentment in created things instead of the Creator); see also Revelation 18:15. The additional descriptor “of the earth” hints at the vast network of international travel implied in the list of goods these merchants organized.
11 And the merchants of the earth weep and mourn for her, since no one buys their cargo anymore,