> There are a lot of ways to put your money into the stock market; some of them feel mostly like “fun gambling,” while others feel like “boring sensible investment of retirement savings in the long-term growth of the economy.” A lot of retail brokerage accounts will let you do both. If you are young, carefree and confident, and don’t have very much money, you might gravitate toward the gambling stuff. And then later, as you get more money and responsibility and grow up a bit, you will get more curious about buy-and-hold investing in low-cost index funds.
> And you can do both of those things — and transition between them — in the same brokerage account. This is good! Arguably it is socially useful for brokerage apps be competitive with, say, sports gambling apps, to be as fun and easy-to-use and exciting and risky as sports gambling. Because investing is competing with sports gambling for young, risk-seeking people’s attention. But the brokerage app is better positioned to transition those people into boring responsible investing. There is no analogous transition in sports gambling. Here is a recent paper finding that sports betting “does not displace other gambling or consumption but significantly reduces savings, as risky bets crowd out positive expected value investments.” Zero-day options are, arguably, a bit better than that.
> Again you cannot get too carried away with this theory. Is it socially beneficial to introduce riskier and zanier financial products to retail brokerages? Well, if the zanier products lure customers away from sports betting, and start them on a road to mature sensible investing, then yes. If the zanier products lure customers away from index funds, and start them on a road away from sensible investing, then no. I’m not sure there’s an a priori answer.