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Comment by kenneth | Hacker News Reader

As someone living in Hong Kong, it kind of blows my mind how little attention Americans have given this situation. All but a few Americans have their head in the sand on this, and the markets have not at all priced in the all but certain long term impact of this.

I've personally broken my long-time rule of no trading public markets and opened a Robinhood account to hedge against this. So far this week I'm up 5x on those hedges. Markets are starting to realize, but I don't think we're even close to having fully priced in the impact of this.

Everybody remembers the 2008 recession. A subset of people during that recession made a killing. The Big Short was a great book (and movie) about this. This is probably the first new opportunity to be a "big shorter."

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I'd love to agree with you, but I keep being reminded that 'the market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent.'

Sure, I'm nearly certain this is going to give us 2-4 quarters of negative growth, worldwide, but I don't know when the market is actually going to price that in.

Morgan Stanley already is betting on a return to positive growth sometime in late Q2. I won’t bet against them.

Finance illiterate question: how do you know what Morgan Stanley is betting on? I'd assume they don't divulge their trading bets.

Generally each bank has many fund managers and analysts that do a lot of public speaking about their bets, thoughts, and speculations. You'll see them on public news stations as guest commentators

Given what they say has an effect on how others trade, do you think that they may not be completely forthright unless it was in the best interest of their bet?

Morgan Stanley was betting that subprime mortgage CDOs were sound in 2006. How'd that work out for them?

Your timing was good since you bought when the market may have been mispricing volatility. Assuming these are puts, a lot if your gain is from the volatility shoot up.

At this point, the market has corrected volatility pricing dramatically (vix is doubled). Odds are over 50% we'll see sp500 drop below 2900 in next month (Black Scholes). But that doesn't mean a short is profitable - I recall 2008 but also the false recession of late 2018 - few people could have accurately predicted both results.

> A subset of people during that recession made a killing.

And a lot of people lost a lot of money trying to time that. It wasn't if, but when. People were talking about the mortgage driven bubble for years by the time 2008 rolled around.

I think it's because the death rate is hard to track and while "high" does not seem nearly as bad as the spanish flu. In part, the damage appears to be China's methods of trying to contain the virus that are making it worse...

For instance, the death rates appear to have a distribution mostly impacting the elderly (incidentally those who are also most likely to have a weaker immune system, but also believe in less conventional medicine:

80+ years old 14.8%

70-79 years old 8.0%

60-69 years old 3.6%

50-59 years old 1.3%

40-49 years old 0.4%

30-39 years old 0.2%

20-29 years old 0.2%

10-19 years old 0.2%

0-9 years old no fatalities

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-age-se...

Not saying this isn't bad, the current stats are showing something around a 0.7% mortality rate[2][3]. The real scare here, is like the spanish flu, there's a chance it can evolve into a more deadly strain (such as SARS) the more people who contract it. If that's the case, we could be seeing 10% fatality rates across the board.

If you're interested in the history of the spanish flu, there's a great series here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQ9WX4qVxEo&list=PLhyKYa0YJ_...

In any case, general point, people American's aren't super worried about it because we have a great healthcare system, and it's spread is limited thus far. I do think a panic will set in as every major city likely now has infected individuals. So it's a good time to pull out of the market.

[2] https://www.statnews.com/2020/02/25/new-data-from-china-butt...

[3] https://www.marketwatch.com/story/coronavirus-update-79339-c...

The reason that the Spanish Flu evolved into a more deadly strain was because WWI was going on. The mild cases stayed at the front lines while the severe ones went home and spread the severe strain around.

This won't happen here because the severe strain will die out. Viruses generally become less lethal as they spread.

> This won't happen here because the severe strain will die out.

Can you please elaborate why this is the case? What if mild cases stay home while patients with severe cases go out looking for medical care, spreading it around? I know nothing about epidemiology, virology, etc. so I would appreciate a little hand-holding.

Viruses undergo natural selection too. A virus that's less lethal has the host as a virus factory for longer. A virus with less overt symptoms is more readily spread to new hosts.

The counterexample to this line of thinking is a lethal virus with a lengthy incubation period that can transmit while the host is asymptomatic.

That's the history of syphilis if i understand correctly. It started out as a serious plague that covered its host in oozing sores and killed them in a couple months, now its symptoms are much less severe and it kills in a matter of decades.

You just described HIV.

Viruses are trying to replicate, not necessarily kill the host. Hence selection pressures will skew it towards “Antibody resistant, lower fatality”. The common-cold is the most successfully virus for a reason. It’s constantly being spread...which is all the virus ultimately “cares” about. (I know viruses / dna don’t have desires, I’m just using shorthand to discuss the selection pressures). Viruses that kill their host ultimately are losing a means of transmission.

OK, I understand all this.

> Hence selection pressures will skew it towards “Antibody resistant, lower fatality”

But that's my question: Will it in this case? If those with severe symptoms are more likely to go out and spread the disease, wouldn't the more severe version be positively selected?

People stay home when they feel like crap. I bet parent comment is right that severe symptoms are selected against.

> Hence selection pressures will skew it towards “Antibody resistant, lower fatality”

That is pressure on the humans. All the humans that will die easily will die and all the survivors will be the more resistant ones.

The virus itself does not behave strategically. Species, other than humans, have no particular ability to plan how they evolve. The only pressures on the virus itself are for longer incubation times, faster ability to spread and the ability to reinfect people. Even if it could strategise there is no particular pressure on the virus whether it kills its host or not as long as it gets passed on to a few people in excess of the original host.

Not really true. The selective advantage is to viruses which can spread to more new hosts. The longer you keep the host arrive, the more new hosts are colonised. If it kills without spreading it’s not going to survive.

> Hence selection pressures will skew it towards “Antibody resistant, lower fatality”

Those selection pressures don't appear until the exponential growth slows down. From the virus perspective right now and in the near term it's super successful, so there's no need to adapt.

Extra history is fantastic, thanks for sharing.

The problem here isn't with the mortality per se, it's with the strain on healthcare resources. We just don't have the capacity to deal with an influx of cases requiring hospitalization. Currently about 10%+ of COVID-19 require that. We don't have the beds, the oxygen support, the ventilators, and generally the ability to keep these people from infecting others. That leads to scenes like in Wuhan where people get turned away from hospitals, where they end up dying at home, where bodies require mass cremation, etc. This could happen anywhere. The US healthcare system is not prepared for this. (I don't believe for a second in the assertion that it's the best in the world. Perhaps quality of care is good, but the system that pays for it is a joke. But it's also hugely variable, with some great hospitals attached to university research centers, and a ton of terrible underfunded ones.)

There was article yesterday that one of cruise passenger coming back to USA felt weak and had fewer, but Miami Hospital told him it will cost $3,700 to test his blood. He went home without testing and 3 days later came back with positive result for cornv-19. so much for “best healthcare” if you can’t afford it.

What a joke. Sometimes I am just amazed America still exists.

Wuhan later realized the problem that you cannot build ICU rooms as fast. But what is actually need is isolation. They turned stadiums into huge hospitals for those mid-age non-urgent positives. At least they are not spreading viruses to family members. So far it worked pretty well and I just don't see a better way.

This is a war. Been in US for several years, I would say US medical system is not designed for scalability and I have huge doubt if it would work.

So far this proved to be working.

> American's aren't super worried about it because we have a great healthcare system

Good joke. You may have great healthcare if you are very rich. Otherwise...

??? You don't need to be very rich to have great healthcare.

If you are poor you get free healthcare, if you have a bit more money you get great healthcare by buying insurance, usually your employer offers it.

The worst you can say is that most people have a several thousand dollar deductible, which isn't great, but it's also not bank breaking.

Considering the vast majority of Americans do not have jobs that provide good insurance nor have thousands of dollars in savings, I would say you are agreeing that no, the vast majority does not have "great healthcare".

Which is precisely what was claimed.

The situation is not good but not quite as dire as you claim. Roughly half of Americans get healthcare from their employer. And while “good insurance” is subjective, it looks like 75% of those people have deductibles under $2000. So not great, but not quite as horrible as “vast majority” imo.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/25/health/employer-health-in...

Let's sink that in: 2/3 of the population from your own numbers do not have insurance or an insurance they can pay the deductible for.

Alright, it is not a vast majority numerically. It is still a catastrophe waiting to happen in comparison with other countries.

Not sure how you came up with 2/3rds. A significant portion of the half of Americans who don’t get healthcare from their employer get it from Medicare, Medicaid, or other government programs.

> a several thousand dollar deductible, which isn't great, but it's also not bank breaking.

40% of Americans couldn’t come up with $400 for an unexpected expense.[0]

[0] https://www.cnbc.com/2019/07/20/heres-why-so-many-americans-...

Not as bad as the Spanish flu isn't really assuring:

> The global death toll was inconceivable: according to the most recent estimates, between 50 million and 100 million people worldwide perished in the three pandemic waves between the spring of 1918 and the winter of 1919. Adjusting for population growth, that is equivalent to between 200 million and 425 million today.

About the US healthcare system, I was reading this article about a guy who had to pay to be tested. I don't know if this is representative, but it seems quite worrying.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/coronaviru...

If 8-20% of cases go critical/ ICU the insurance cost will end a ton of peoples lifes long term.

> American's aren't super worried about it because we have a great healthcare system,

I am sorry, have you ever been to a hospital? I cannot read that with a straight face at all.

In our culture, providers are more interested with how they get paid than providing care.

People tend to avoid care completely just to avoid the hassle.

Either we know different Americans, or have different expectations of what their response is likely to be. I have heard from several friends and from family about their acquisition of significant quantities of non-perishable food, boxes of face masks, and ammo. Definitely don't have their heads in the sand.

I'm somewhat closer to "head in the sand" myself. I am watching the news closely, but don't feel anything I can do in my immediate daily life is consequential to the situation.

and ammo

Yeah those type of people always think civilisation is about to collapse. And lots of them are looking forward to it.

Well, a lot of the folks I know who stockpile ammo are cops or veterans (or both) and as such would very much not be looking forward to any collapse, since they've very likely experienced a taste of what that would actually be like.

The measure of interest isn’t that those people exist, it’s whether there are more and how much ammo is bought. That change is of interest to me.

I just bought 5k of 9mm... virus unrelated. Season is coming up and I’m out of practice. After these, I’ll have fresh brass and reload. Last year I ran about 15k, this year I bet 8k tops. Just too busy.

What season require 9mm?

USPSA, IDPA, 3Gun, and teaching/training.

Well, none of them are the weirdo doomsday prepper types who (as you say) seem to almost look forward to societal collapse in a creepy, power-fantasy way. For these friends and family, it is just a commonly-assumed, shared ethos. They do the same every time a hurricane draws near their part of the gulf coast, and are the first to try and help neighbors, friends or even strangers who need it if those folks are in need.

Stocking up in advance of $WIDELY_REPORTED_THREAT is not something you really question, because it is what you, and everyone you know, has always done for as long as you can remember. Sometimes it has even come in handy and helped people.

Stocking up on ammo seems very weird for someone outside the US.

It seems very weird for someone inside the US.

It seems a little weird for someone from the semi-rural US, because you probably already had ammo on hand.

I admit I “panic bought” some ammo. It’s for a practical reason, though - my preferred manufacturer for .300 AAC is Australian, and I figure there is at least a chance that the economic disruptions will impact its availability. If so, I picked up as much as I’d normally expect to shoot in the next six months.

Is owning guns and ammo "for shooting" a hobby throughout the country or just in the more rural areas? I'm wondering what facilities are there for something like that in urban environments.

Indoor range exist, but they're often expensive and poorly ventilated. People certainly use them, and some indoor ranges even host USPSA or IDPA matches. You'll want access to an outside range for most forms of recreational rifle shooting.

The old movie Beverly Hills Cop shows a posh gun club in Beverly Hills, but I have no idea if it was or is there.

There absolutely are. I've only ever lived in Urban and Suburban environments in the US for the last 10 years, and the furthest I've ever been from a gun range is probably 15 minutes.

Ranges are far easier to find in urban areas. I live in a town of about 10k, and there is only one pistol range nearby. It opened last year. Before that, you had to either have land or have access to land to shoot.

Hearing gunfire isn’t at all uncommon here. I live right on the edge of city limits, and I doubt a day goes by without being able to hear someone shoot if I’m sitting on my back porch. I totally get that it’s a cultural difference, but it’s very common throughout the US. The only exceptions are very dense urban areas, really.

I’ve heard it said that there are two kinds of places in the US, and they’re categorized by what sound makes you worry. In some places, if you hear an emergency vehicle’s siren you ignore it, but get concerned if you hear gunfire. In others, you ignore the sound of gunfire but get concerned if you hear an emergency vehicle. I definitely live in the latter kind of place.

Ammunition is a durable good as long as it’s kept dry and stays for years. In situations you can bargain with it, use it, and in a best case scenario nothing happens and you simply go shoot it for fun. In a worst case scenario... well it’s pretty self explanatory at that point.

I don't find worst case there to be self explanatory. People put general "self explanatory" in there, cause they dont want to say what they intend to do with those guns.

I don't recall armed individuals with whatever they stocked for themselves to make difference when real issues happen.

What made difference were organized trained ideological groups with those arms. So, in that case, I am really interested to know which ideological group are those people stocking for - and against who they intend to use those guns.

That is why it dont make sense to stock some ammo in abstract and why the expression is slimmy.

Huh? During the LA riots, Korean shopkeepers were successful in using guns to deter rioters from looting their businesses.

Well, if you are not able to own a firearm, then yeah, stockpiling ammo would definitely look weird.

In most countries you definitely can own a gun as long as you have some suitable grounds for that, likely hobby in hunting or range shooting (maybe requiring a club membership). Those just aren't super common hobbies.

Owning a gun just for self-defence isn't generally allowed or needed, and would of course be counterproductive anyway as using lethal force would likely land you in much deeper trouble than the looter would face. I'd end with "rightfully so" but I do realize there are deep cultural differences regarding this point.

> Owning a gun just for self-defence isn't generally allowed or needed, and would of course be counterproductive anyway as using lethal force would likely land you in much deeper trouble than the looter would face. I'd end with "rightfully so" but I do realize there are deep cultural differences regarding this point.

Not in certain US states (look up "stand-your-ground" laws).

My reply to the parent was for providing out-of-US view about the circumstances for owning a gun.

I agree with you, but that's exactly what I was talking about. In a place where majority of the people cannot just go and buy a firearm without getting a bunch of special permits and club memberships (with gun ownership being pretty rare to begin with), it would definitely seem weird to stockpile ammo.

What's your plan if something does happen, be it this virus, a war or other?

Sit back and wait for the state to save you? I'm not American myself but the lack of self-reliance exhibited by non-Americans, particularly Europeans, is sometimes bewildering.

Those who have lived through a failed state know that no amount of personal fire-power will protect you from a ruling-party politician with the local constabulary in his pocket.

But if it makes you feel better…

A more generous interpretation of comment you're replying to: It's not that guns and ammo are useful for resisting your local government. They're saying that in the event of catastrophe, it's not a smart bet to rely on local government for protection from human chaos (like looters after your food).

Who causes the degradation of society more? The starving person looting, or the "prepared" person shooting?

I don't have an answer for this, but it's something worth keeping in the back of your mind when discussing theoretical catastrophes.

I didn't think my comment was ungenerous - apologies.

What I mean is that evidence shows that when a society collapses, the corrupt and evil will explicitly use the state's monopoly on violence to take what you are trying to defend.

Typically they juice this by exploiting local grievances to de-ligitimise your claim to your property and co-opt the local law enforcement with promises of future gains.

Then they will appear at your homestead WITH the local enforcement - who will do nothing when the mob takes yours assets.

At one level this is to discourage you and increase your sense of isolation - to get you to just abandon your assets and leave. At which point they move onto the next property/resource owner.

However, at another level they WANT to to fight back - with firearms preferably. Not only will this still be deemed illegal (under laws passed by the old functioning society) but hopefully (from their perspective) you injure or kill one of the riled-up mob - further de-legitimising you.

At this point, the co-opted law enforcement will step in, arrest you, etc.

Zimbabwe, the Balkans, and Indonesia are text-book examples.

When society fails violently, there really is no hope.

I wish it wasn't thus, but is is and will be.

I like to think that police and military personnel have family and friends they care about too, and aren't soulless robots ready to gun down their fellow men and women who they took vows to serve when they joined the force at the command of a suit in Washington. Think, if you were them, what kind of world would you like you, your family, and friends to live in? I find that enough of them would make the right decision that if the PEOPLE fought back, they would have a winning chance. Think about the rest of the world too. Is Russia going to sit back and do nothing, when they could be funding/supporting those rebels against the U.S. government instead? AND they can do it from the moral high ground too, since they're helping the oppressed rebels against a totalitarian government. Extra power.

The U.S. was founded on rebellion. And I believe enough Americans would readily backstab an illegitimate U.S. government (one that has stopped serving its people and instead serves itself) in pursuit of good.

1. s/I like to think/I like to HOPE/

FTFY

2.The U.S. was founded on rebellion.

So was Somalia. Its not a sufficient reason to protect you from the failure mode I explained above.

If the army come after you no amount of arms will save you because they have more and they’re better trained. But if you have a defensible position, enough food and ammunition a small armed group can absolutely hold off another small armed group or a much larger worse armed one. Most of these people are no doubt basically LARPing in their heads. See the Koreans during the LA riots. Even against the state a small group can hold out for a relatively long time. See Waco. It took tanks to breach their defenses.

Few are buying guns and ammo to protect themselves from the government. They are buying them to protect themselves from other citizens should riots break out and rule of law break down, even momentarily. In the last 30 years there have been riots in the US after the announcement of the results of criminal trials in which millions of dollars in damages and people attacking each other. People assault each other every year during Black Friday sales. It's not all that absurd of a notion that it might be good to be able to protect oneself in the event of a truly destructive pandemic.

What's your plan if something does happen, be it this virus, a war or other?

This varies very much on the "something". In the case of a virus like this I have plans to do what seems sensible - keep washing my hands, isolate myself as much as possible.

In the case of a war I'll hope my side wins and keep my head down if it doesn't. Not sure stockpiled ammo is going to be the critical factor there!

Regarding war before the 20th century, Total war[1] was an exception. The plan for European civilians since antiquity was basically life as usual, war was a matter of political power and resources, farms weren't burned and population killed since they were the goal of the war in the first place.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_war

Everyone here is raised learning the history of USA, overthrowing a tyrannical empire and creating our own democracy. We're taught that the Constitution was designed with inherant distrust and selfishness of politicians in mind. Many of us in non-urban areas grew up in areas with police response times greater than 20 minutes. All this and more combines into a self-reliant culture somewhat distrustful of the government that makes us ready to protect ourselves and our families. When considering this culture and context, guns and ammo during times of stress makes more sense.

The plan for European civilians since antiquity was basically life as usual, war was a matter of political power and resources, farms weren't burned and population killed since they were the goal of the war in the first place.

Total war may have been the exception, but farms and cities both suffered enormously during pre-20th century European warfare. Indeed the page you linked gave a bunch of examples of total destruction prior to the 20th century.

Outside those examples, most warfare then relied on looting farms for supplies (including seed crops)[1]. Indeed there was a whole technique of warfare called Chevauchée which relied on this before the 14th century:

A chevauchée [..] was a raiding method of medieval warfare for weakening the enemy, primarily by burning and pillaging enemy territory in order to reduce the productivity of a region, as opposed to siege warfare or wars of conquest... The chevauchée has gained recognition for its use during the Hundred Years' War between the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of France. It was not a new tactic and had been used many times before; for example, William the Conqueror had used the tactic before the Battle of Hastings to encourage Harold to engage in a battle.[2]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_warfare#Supplies_and_...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevauchée

We're also stocking up on booze, weed, and meth, if that makes it seem less weird.

Well, having ammo at hand would be useful if the virus mutated into a zombie virus...

Social distancing, avoiding crowds and certain events, washing hands routinely and before meals, wearing masks when ill would help reduce the spread speed a lot.

Wearing masks also helps set a new social norm. It is now common in Taiwan subways and trains--basically everyone wears a mask.

I have lived in Asia, so I am familiar with the model. Currently I am in a medium-sized city that isn't a major transit hub. I would take my own personal medical precautions, to be sure, if anyone within 2-3 counties away were a suspected case. That is the reason for my keeping an eye on the news. I don't have money to stockpile, much less concern myself with market-related shenanigans.

> It is now common in Taiwan subways and trains--basically everyone wears a mask.

Not clear if it's useful to wear a mask if not displaying any symptoms. I didn't see any official recommendations for doing so. I've been traveling quite a bit in Asia these last few weeks, and I'd say 80% in planes wear masks. However, most of them don't use them properly. They take them on and off, reuse them, adjust them, touch their faces. Sometimes they don't even wear masks, but piece of clothes.

I get food and masks

But for what on earth do they need to stock up on ammo?

For an European that's beyond strange

As a european just look inwards at our neighbor - Switzerland.

Switzerland has fairly strict gun possession laws, people have a military issue rifle at home, but do not possess ammunition. They also aren't allowed to carry/transport it except very specific situations (eg going from/to shooting range for training).

So yes not comparable.

The argument is essentially that if there comes a time of great shortage, whatever you've stashed for your own survival can be taken from you on a whim if you haven't the resources to defend that stash from those who would seek to take it from you for themselves.

Suppose someone else wants your stockpile of food and masks? Or that riots happen. Or that emergency services are overwhelmed and crime is a problem.

Ammunition is relatively cheap and extremely high value if it's needed, and more likely to be needed in an emergency.

Perhaps because those people who "want your stockpile" might have guns too.

During Hurricane Sandy in the New York area, I was flooded in Jersey City and there was no power — there were roving gangs stealing throughout the neighborhoods. The police response was impossible. So yes, in the event of a serious catastrophe, you aren’t going to be able to depend on police to protect you.

During Katrina, there was widespread looting but also violent gang rapes and other assaults. People, especially in inner cities, are easily victims of violence and theft.

If you’re talking about the convention center, that was blown way out of proportion

A lot of Americans have fantasies about killing their fellow citizen in some sort of "zombie", "collapse", or "boogaloo" scenario.

A good look into what this looks like would be the Algiers Point shooting in the Hurricane Katrina aftermath.

Ammo is in case of violent civil unrest. As a European here is the complete list of European countries that did not have a civil war and were not invaded in Europe 1900-2000. Sweden, Switzerland, Lichtenstein.

Considering the first - and second world wars during this time period I'm not sure if that statement is really relevant for the issue.

European civil wars, 1900-2000

Russia, Germany, Finland, Ireland, Austria, Portugal, Yugoslavia three times, Spain, Poland, Greece, Romania, Cyprus, Georgia, Albania

How exactly are you investing in Robinhood?

I dollar cost average, but I plan to pick up extra stock in corona bear market if I can scratch any extra cash together.

Buying puts against overvalued vulnerable companies + the market in general.

Sample size of one, but, everyone at the office today was talking about this, my parents and my wife's parents both called to ask what we thought about it... seems like it's very top of mind for most people I know.

Good time to load up on gold and us dollars. I think coronavirus will be the catalyst to end the business cycle and blow the top off some of the major fiscal problems that have popped up.

... and then you want to buy dollars? FYI gold and dollars are usually inversely correlated.

So are gold and stocks, yet they both went down on Tuesday. The market is very strange nowadays.

And when the retail investors get excited, smart money goes elsewhere, the parties already over...

The American president is railing against news organizations that are paying attention to the outbreak.

He's rightly railing against news organizations that are trying to stoke FUD and panic.

What impact do you think there's going to be five years from now?

If you come out on top with your hedging, will you donate the profits to relief / training / prevention / education causes? Otherwise, you're literally profiting from the misfortune of others.

If things are mispriced, the trade is going to happen. There is absolutely no way it could not.

If it makes you feel better, many of the wealthiest traders do in fact donate a lot of money to such causes.

"If things are mispriced, the trade is going to happen. There is absolutely no way it could not."

That's fatalistic. The only way the trade happens is if someone places the trade. If you see the trade as immoral, don't place the trade. If someone else profits from it, so be it, but at least you didn't. Please extrapolate the consequences of your trades. If it feels even slightly dodgy, it probably is, and no matter how you justify it, it was a bad thing to do.

As far as that goes, I don't see trades as immoral, as long as traders are following our laws and the rules of the market. I'd go so far as to say it's virtuous. Trades communicate price information, and that's good for everyone.

If you're concerned about the immorality of economic choices, then you should consider the idea that you yourself are already acting in grossly immoral ways with your money. Read this to see why: https://www.nytimes.com/1999/09/05/magazine/the-singer-solut...

Efficient markets are good for society, they give us accurate prices for things, and inform us of the impact of events. They're not perfect, but they're better than everything else.

Sometimes they are wrong, the price is wrong. If my intuition is correct, my trades help push the price towards the correct direction and make the markets more efficient. If I'm wrong, I lose money.

Hopefully I will profit from spotting an inefficiency in the market that many other did not.

Not everything must be altruistic. The misfortune (some inevitable, some preventable due to bad leadership) will happen anyways. I don't see anything wrong with profiting off of it.

"Efficient markets are good for society, they give us accurate prices for things, and inform us of the impact of events."

Efficient evolution is also good for society. This doesn't mean that we actively kill off the branches of humanity that seem less than ideal.

Every trade you make has effects in the lives of actual people. Don't look at "markets" as the flow of currency. They are often the livelihood of actual people, and when you start hedging on literal life and death, you don't have much wiggle-room to moralize.

"Not everything must be altruistic". No, but if it can be, it should be.

"The misfortune (some inevitable, some preventable due to bad leadership) will happen anyways". Yes, this is why I asked if the profits would go to alleviating this in future incidents. You can't stop the current misfortune, but you may be able to stop the future misfortune.

Anyway, good health to you and yours.

Everyone I know is worried about it.

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