Yeah. Knowing that there are a bunch of “little people” who will be left with a massively overvalued stock mitigates the glee I feel over watching the investment firms get screwed.
But I gotta be honest, I’m enjoying this.
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This is a good way to explain the value of fiat currency to the “gold standard” crowd. Not that they usually agree–Rand Paul seems to believe that gold has an intrinsic value, but in the next breath will say that we can set the value in order to have enough gold to meet the demands of a global economy.
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Sure, I have too. But I meant pivot, as in turn the whole business towards that and skip the actual games. I dunno. None of this makes any sense anyways.
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Ah, good to know. I should probably read r/WSB, but as has been noted many times and is totally painfully obvious every time I happen to glance over there: the sub is completely chock full of total asshats. I can only take so much.
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I read about it elsewhere. I’m not going near a tr0ll cesspool.
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“This isn’t investing, this is gambling,”
Duh. The stock market (the stock exchanges, aka the “secondary market”) that plebes can access is purely a zero-sum casino game. It is NOT investing. The investing happens on the primary market, where the giant investment banks buy the actual stock issue. Then they sell it on to the secondary market, expecting to make a profit with the “IPO”. The company doesn’t make a dime from that; nor from anything else in the stock market other than themselves gambling.
There is a very small exception, which is that if the company withholds stock from the primary market they can then sell it on the secondary market later. This can raise more capital for the business, but is not done very frequently. Instead, once the company is established, it raises more capital through the bond market, aka loans that don’t ever have to be repaid. Which is also sold only to the primary market, and then passed on to the secondary market.
TL,DR: The primary market is investing. The secondary market is just gambling, full stop.
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At least they’re being honest…
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When you bet on whether a horse wins or not, that’s called gambling. When you bet on whether a stock goes up or down, that’s called investing. See the difference?
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This has been the narrative in the media. George Stephanopoilis lamenting that “some hedge fund investors have actually lost billions” almost made my eyes roll out the back of my head. All the concern driving trollies in the media about how the non-professionals are taking a huge risk and should stop doing this has been disgusting.
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All the while they’re fine with Hedgefunds basically short selling corporate bonds that don’t actually exist yet. This is why the situation is absurd. They’re mad that it’s cheaper to buy options and thus push them out than they are about their foolish tactic of trying to outstrip the supply of a given stock on the market in their short sell. Maybe there needs to be more regulation on their habits than on people buying into the Streisand Effect of their whining on CNBC. Seriously, I just bought a dollar of GME and AMC just to spite them. I have no intent to get any money back in any capacity. And oddly many others who have dumped many times that much (hundreds of dollars apparently) are of the same mentality. It’s more than a pump/dump situation. It’s a beast that’s taken on a life larger than its initial irrationality. And they know it.
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The use of this word in Capitalist settings really annoys me. “We (air quotes) lost x amount of money in projected earnings”. Give me a break.
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I am surprised a rival financial company didn’t do what these redditors did sooner. Inflate stocks that were being artificially depressed for fun and profit.
Maybe it is like how sharks don’t each each other.
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Mostly because that would be pump and dump. Retailer traders (most folks) have the excuse of being individual actors not aware of each other or their plans. And thus any liability there isn’t easily passed on by the SEC. A firm doing the same thing is illegal, you doing it because you saw the stock spike in the news is totally fine.
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If you’re a different firm and looked at Game Stop and said, “This stock is undervalued and artificially low, we should invest in it.” - why would that be illegal or any different than what the redditors are doing?
Honest question, I don’t know market legalities well. (Not that it matters, people do illegal shit in the markets all the time.)
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So, as long as the short sellers and hedge funds make money, no problem. The minute anyone challenges the 1% status quo, big problems.
Eventually, this brazen bullshit will get changed.
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Just as an aside to the value of gold–my Uncle purchased some in 1979. I was excited to see that the spot price of gold back then was approx. $459, while the current spot price is approx $1850. Seemed like there must be a big gain in there somewhere, right? Unfortunately, it turns out that matches the rate of inflation almost exactly.
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Where people could sit around and trade stock? That would be an interesting full circle. 
eta:
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And play Diablo 2. God I’m such a boomer nerd.
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