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Comment by UncleMeat | Hacker News Reader

What percentage of people do you think had any idea of the maximum risk they were taking on?

I get emails from my power provider on occasion asking me to opt-in to some program that charges based on usage rather than at a fixed rate. The email basically just says "most people see lower rates" and "use less power at peak times to save money" and says precisely nothing about tail risk. Could my bill go up 100x? I would have no idea.

Yes, buying using the wholesale price incurs risk. But these programs aren't marketed like short selling or options trading - risky decisions for professionals. They are marketed as cost savings measures.

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I can’t speak to Griddy or their marketing, but the here in NY the market for alternate provider “ESCOs” seems to have attracted some really shady players. Their sales tactics range from a little deceptive to outright fraudulent, with door to door and telemarketing sales people going so far as to pretend to be ConEdison employees to get your account number and process the provider change behind the scenes.

I see the Griddy homepage has a graphic showing that they beat the other providers on price 96% of the time...how many of their customers knew at signup time just how bad it could get 4% of the time?

I think there's definitely a "responsible consumer product marketing" angle to this. Companies shouldn't be able to market products deceptively, and some products are too risky to be offered to the general public rather than qualified professionals.

But it seems that in the United States as long as the only thing you are harming is your own bank account you can take on as much risk as you want? I mean people are trading options on Robinhood with their last $500.

As cost saving measures? Maybe partly, but I thought they were heavily marketed as virtuous too, as good for the environment. I wonder if you could make the case that the price spikes wouldn't happen if more (percentagewise) people were exposed to the current price and thus more people incentivized to conserve. Then again, maybe there is no way for enough people to shift demand in an unusual situation like this.

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