Long term market rate of return is positive (extremely positive of late), where as casino gambling is EV negative.
But options and futures exist as a short term hedge on equity investment. Combine that with the vig Robinhood takes on the front end in the form of higher contract prices, and you end up with an EV negative return - more consistent with high stakes gambling than equity investing.
I class market trackers as investing rather than gambling.
Sure they can still go down (and by a lot), but it tends to be big events like COVID that do that, and it soon bounced back up again.
If you're investing more than a few percent of your portfolio in any one company, you're probably gambling though. And sure, nVidia look a safe bet today, but if Sam Altman comes out tomorrow and goes "sorry guys, this ain't going anywhere" then you'll lose over half your money before you can blink.
I wouldn't invest on a timeframe of less than a few years either. It's not for boosting your rent money. It's just better than leaving your spare money in cash. If the concept of "spare money" is alien, then it's probably not for you.
Let's be honest, our "free market" is a regular casino for the plebs that own about 10% of shares in their 401ks and Robinhood accounts, and an intentionally rigged casino for the oligarchs that own the rest, with marked insider information cards, and loaded market manipulation dice.
Gotta love when the bootlickers defend this economy, and market investment, as somehow inclusive, when 93% of stocks are owned by 10% of Americans.
I guess it depends on your main goal. I started out as a gambler then lost a bunch of money and started actually investing. But at the end of the day every transaction you make can be called a gamble.
I just want to tip my hat to Elizabeth Lopatto's writing in this piece. I miss following her on twitter and had forgotten how spicy and on-target she can be. Good stuff.
Citadel commands something like 8-10% of daily market volume. They're the textbook Too Big To Fail investor. SEC won't touch them for that reason alone, although there are plenty of other ideological/conflict of interest reasons, too.
I don't disagree, but it's the whole REASON the SEC was created in 1934.
If anyone needed further proof of end-stage capitalism, it's this goddamn insistence on regressive everything.
Anything deemed "Too Big To Fail" is also a national security risk. Nationalize the whole firm, send the executives off with whatever loot they already have, and ironclad legalese to prevent them from ever setting foot in a financial market again.
All these copium defend the market takes, you telling me Tesla, a failed venture living off government subsidies, is worth 16x more than the hundred year old Ford that actually makes a profit without fraud?
Tesla, a failed venture living off government subsidies
It's not a failed venture precisely because it lives off government money. Show me a Fortune 500 company and I'll show you a large stream of public sector receipts.
Tesla stock prices in the expectation that they'll have robotaxi services and general purpose robots in the near future. And also that they will be leaders in these fields, ahead of the competition.
How likely/unlikely that is to happen is debatable, but that's why some people are valuing the company so high right now.
"Debatable" is a heavy stretch for someone with a 0% track record when it comes to promised tech while repeating "we can do it NOW and it will be available NEXT YEAR!" for a literal decade. Robo taxies were supposed to be EVERYWHERE 4 years ago. Same with SpaceX, we were supposed to be sending the first people to mars this year, yet all Elon has managed was burn 3 bilion tax payer dollars for literal fireworks, as not a single "starship" managed to reach high orbit. Even the cybertruck is a cheap knockoff of what was promised. Not to mention the countless people that have died because he's allowed to beta test his death machines in public. Can't forget his starlink shenanigans in Ukraine, fucking warlord wannabe... Elon is the greatest scam artist in modern history, and it's absolutely disgraceful that he isn't behind bars, let alone valued at all.
Ford are up to their eyeballs in debt, and they completely gave up on making affordable cars, which is the market segment that made Ford what they are in the first place.
Tesla actually makes vehicles normal people can afford to buy and run, so yes, they are worth more than Ford.
TL;DR of this response is that a Tesla is not more affordable for most normal people because what they can purchase is influenced by initial buy in costs/their own budgets at purchase:
Many “normal people” have less than 5K in savings. A model 3 is baseline around $40K plus the infrastructure of chargers you will probably need installed to charge it.
A Ford Bronco Sport or Escape start at 29K and I used them as an example because most Americans are buying SUVs or trucks, not sedans or compacts. No infrastructure needed.
Even with high credit scores, you’re talking at least ~$500 monthly payments even with something like 7K down. I know this because I purchased a new Subaru for about 30K within the past 6 months and my credit score was 815 at the time of purchase and I shopped around for the best APR financing I could get.
You have to remember that long term affordability doesn’t matter. Up front costs are influencing most “normal people” purchases because what you can afford NOW is what you can afford.
As an example of this in action - There’s a reason subscription services see monthly or quarterly as their biggest buy-ins because cheaper up front costs mean more to the consumer who has to invest in the NOW despite the long term being a better deal. I was in marketing for a subscription service and guess what we always sold the most of? If you guessed monthly - have a cookie.
Reality, in which the ford f series is the most sold vehicle for the past 42 years
Pick one
Ford is moving its prices upwards because people want and pay for what they're offering, very clearly given the statistics we have. Also to say that tesla is the brand regular people can afford when both brands have ev trucks and one has a starting msrp almost 30k more than the other is kinda hilarious.
Lastly, ford has a vehicle with an msrp of 23,920 while the lowest priced tesla vehicle is 38,890 dollars. Even taking gas savings over 5 years into account, ($4,223 if you happen to live near my area and drive about 10k miles per year) the tesla is significantly more expensive. Clearly, tesla is not the company concerned with the common man. To make that point even more clear though, one needs only to compare tesla to the Korean and Chinese EVs that are being offered at significantly lower prices.
Bruh, wtf you think stock trading is? Buying into funds is just hiring professional gamblers to work for you, "insider trading* is cheating and dark pools is just the high rollers table.
In gambling, the house always wins, by extracting value from the players. In stock trading, the players (capitalists) collectively always win, by extracting value from labor, technological growth, and natural resources. These are not the same picture.
Sure, you can take on as much risk as you like using derivatives, and emulate a gambler using the stock market as a source of randomness (volatility). But that's not how most traders behave, and it's not how most traders' payoffs work.
In gambling, the house always wins, by extracting value from the players. In stock trading, the players (capitalists) collectively always win, by extracting value from labor, technological growth, and natural resources. These are not the same picture.
Excellent analogy. People who equate the stock market and gambling should go look up where the DJIA stood in October 1994. The slot machines in Vegas don't magically start spitting out profit just because you're patient, but stocks generally do over time.
In gambling, the house always wins, by extracting value from the players. In stock trading, the players (capitalists) collectively always win, by extracting value from labor, technological growth, and natural resources. These are not the same picture.
"Possibility" but not an "actuality" since share prices are typically based on the feelings of major investors and not necessarily what's actually happening within a company.
Even before that they have been accused of not buying stocks ordered by users, then buying at sell order and waiting for the price to raise to sell so they get a profit. It's been questioned a long time.
Let’s pause — I would like to reflect on this incredible phrase, about an asset class that democratizes access to events as they unfold. See, I thought we all had access to the events of the election because we all exist in reality and can find out about them. But apparently, if we can’t gamble on an event, it isn’t happening. This is a fascinating vision of metaphysics, and I would like to hear more about it. No one bet on my birth, for instance, and thus there is no asset class relating to my existence. So am I real?