Death comes to us all. Life's but a walking shadow | If we're going to get all philosophical here please allow me to pontificate.
Humble Farmer, I respectfully disagree. The futures market supposedly exists to facilitate "Price Discovery" and allow producer & users to hedge production and needs. But when you look closely at its structure and function I'm not so sure I agree. Particularly when you look at the participants today and consider their individual interests. For instance originally the traders and speculators were supposed to act like insurance underwriters (Old MacDonald). But today the size & economic muscle of the money managers and speculators is three times that of the Commercial participants (producers & endusers). What started out as a simple system of hedging has become an institutionalized system of extracting money from your part of the economy.
Leaving the question of fairness completely aside, this economic system was invented by "men" and there is no legal or moral requirement that you are obligated to follow it. You can choose to but you don't have to. You and I mean you collectively (including myself) simple need to decide where the benefits are sufficient and penalties acceptable.
Let me make an analogy, slavery was an economic system that relied on a political system for its legitimacy. It wasn't a very efficient system because it required brutal coercion to maintain and the workers weren't very willing. It very well may have continued to exist today except enough people came to believe that its penalty to the many far out weighed the benefits to the few and the few could no longer impose their will on the others. Remember moral outrage very often disguises economic interest.
Enough of this. |
The market doesn't owe you a profit
