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Comment by Analemma_ | Hacker News Reader

The SEC declining to approve some investment vehicle is not unusual at all. Compare that to the USD, where nothing short of global nuclear war is going to cause a 10-minute 25% swing.

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On 2001-09-11 gasoline tripled, food doubled, and bottled water as much as quadrupled or quintupled in dollar pricing in parts of the US in less than a day.

Yes, there were in fact $4/gallon, $5/gallon, and even $8/gallon gasoline and diesel prices posted, many by noon. This also increased the price of everything shipped by truck for a while, too.

Prices came off that peak quickly, but took months to years to revert completely.

I don't think storing value in diesel fuel is a good idea either.

you'll be surprised to find out where your pension fund stores your money.

Gas prices actually dropped in the months after 9/11 [1]. Any place that was charging $8 per gallon day of was guilty of price gouging. Either way, you are comparing an SEC decision to the aftermath of the largest terrorist attack in history. Don't you think the scale of these two events is a little different?

[1] - https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=E...

Parent post said "nothing short of a global nuclear war". Don't you think that's yet another difference in scale?

That wasn't a swing in the value of the dollar, that was a swing in the value of those goods.

The price of a christmas tree drops precipitously the ~9PM on christmas eve every year, that says nothing about the value of a dollar.

Well, to be fair, the value of the dollar is determined by its buying power. If goods widely increased in cost, then the effective value of the dollar has decreased.

Not saying that's what did or didn't happen on 9/11, though.

Yes, if all goods widely increased in cost (or at least, most). If it's only the goods that people buy in anticipation of (e.g.) a catastrophe, or goods that rely on those aforementioned goods to be manufactured and/or delivered, then the above comment is correct.

There is a difference between localized price gouging and the value globally of a dollar.

If I charge $1000 to eat a cracker from my cupboard, the value of a dollar didn't suddenly decrease by 99.99%.

"This is unusual" is "the 25% drop." Over the past year, it's been pretty boring.

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