Non-delivery churn and burn speculators are worse than shills.
Someone asked a famous bank robber why he robbed banks, he said “because that is where the money is”.
So it is with economic systems, there hasn’t been a system like capitalism for generating new capital and naturally this will attract all kinds of thieves. There is plenty of “surplus” for the unethical to leech out of the system. I’m not talking about legitimate futures traders like a farmer buying futures contracts with intent to deliver. I’m talking about a speculative “purchase agent” that is driven by only by market swings, his only goal being to suck money out of the swing. They might even deliberately manipulate the market to cause an artificial swing. Will any of you say it doesn’t happen? And when it does will any of you call it capitalism? These guys are not capitalists. I knew someone 15 yrs ago who was set up with a satellite link in his home for speculating in the commodities futures market. His only purpose was to suck money out of a market swing. It doesn’t even matter what way the market swings for these leeches to suck money out. How would I explain declining gas prices? Well you can bet someone is sucking money out of the down swing. The feel good term these leeches use for that is “shorting the market”. Think about that for a second what kind of ethics does it take to bet on the market declining? Someone who shorts the market wants it to go down. That is capitalism?? It is legal, people do it, but it is not capitalism IMO.
Capitalism is not the guy who buys a token at a casino, who buys a futures contract, with the very specific greedy hope of the machine paying out. The guy that doesn’t care one bit that when the machine does pay out it is with someone elses money, someone who what trying to do the same thing as him but lost instead of won. That is how that kind of speculation works, it simply churns existing money, the winner wins at the expense of the loser. This is a totally different concept of “prosperity” than creating new wealth through production (work), wealth that never existed before. Creating new wealth doesn’t happen on the trading floor, or in the casino, it happens on the factory floor, or in the farmers field.
Who does he purchase from?
The feel good term these leeches use for that is “shorting the market”. Think about that for a second what kind of ethics does it take to bet on the market declining?
Futures traders are evil because they make prices go up? Futures traders are evil because they make prices go down? You're hilarious.
If I go to my corner gas station and tell the owner that I'd like to buy 100 gallons of gas today, to be pumped into my car one year from now. Regardless of any price we mutually agree upon, does that make me a bad person? Does that make the owner a bad person?
How about if I tell the owner that I'll pay him $500 for the rights to any profit above todays price plus $.50 for 1000 gallons sold by his station one year from now - am I a bad person? Is the gas station owner a bad person? Or are we only bad people if the price for gas one year from now results in one of us making money off of the bargain?
I maintain my securities in a margin account, which allows other people to borrow those securities and sell them short - does that make me a bad person, or just the folks who borrow my shares?