The Essex Boys: how nine traders hit a gusher with negative oil

Re:The Essex Boys: how nine traders hit a gusher with negati... by WA on Sunday December 20, 2020 @06:12AM (#25485460)

Good examples and yes, that makes the utility clear. But it's still zero-sum in dollar terms. So, if there is a big story about "The boys who made 600 million dollars with oil futures contracts", that is strictly in terms of dollar value and their gain (a good trade), is someone else's loss. That is what I'm talking about in response to my parent poster, who claimed:

> "There are limited resources and society have decided that these people deserve a big chunk of that resources."

As if society decided collectively to pay an unfair amount to a good/lucky trader. They took it from other market participants and not from average joe. My intention with my initial comment was to point out that it simply doesn't matter if one market participant has 600 million more than before, because others in the market lost it.

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Re:The Essex Boys: how nine traders hit a gusher with negati... by hnracer on Sunday December 20, 2020 @06:41AM (#25485594)

I think we agree with that statement of fact that it's zero sum in dollar terms. I would only object if we were to take that further as a commentary on the goodness or badness of such an occurrence, since the nature of every transaction is that it's zero sum in dollars.

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