Quote for the Week
The game is getting today as it always has and as it always will, for besides the greed motive in stock speculation there is also the call of adventure, the fascination of danger that, in turn, begets the curious delusion that a man’s profit must always be commensurate with the risk he takes. When a man stands to lose his all he thinks he ought at least to double it. You find this in every business. Even those to whom stock speculation appears immoral or stupid look through equally unreliable telescopes at the colossal fortunes won by the great captains of industry in a short, breathless decade. It was all they could play it for, because the game itself was not always worth much. To create, to do, to win — that is how and why they play it.
But what makes the game of stock speculation the most dangerous of all is the variety of pleasing disguises it is able to assume. Being born of greed, it feeds on greed and thereby waxes greater. If that were all it did, or if it did this openly, it would not be so dangerous; but besides the additional lure of adventure there is the irresistible appeal to vanity, the challenge to pit your wits against other wits, and even against Nature and the vagaries of the weather and the weaknesses of men. It most often masquerades as a legitimate business operation, subject to and governed by the ordinary rules of ordinary business. Of course, one reason for this is that the buying and selling of stocks do not necessarily constitute gambling. The buying or selling of stocks on margin in expectation of immediate and large profits is probably gambling and nothing else, whether or not you have a scientific system that cannot fail. — Edwin Lefevre (source)
From the Archives
Last Call
- What A World (A few Stories) – M. Housel
- The Grand Illusion – Uncertainty of It All
- Panic Season – Owenomics
- Dear Regret – Safal Niveshak
- 2025 Tax Law Changes Explained: What the OBBA Means for You – Savor Financial
- IPOs on Tap: Financing the 1933 Brewery Boom – Financial History Mag
- The Imitation Game: Defending against AI’s Dark Side! – Musings on Markets
- What the Marshmallow Test Got Wrong About Child Psychology – Psyche
- How Bread vs Rice Molded History – Uncharted Territories
- How Pac-Man Changed Gaming – and the World – BBC