Comment by hindsightbias
2 months ago
What’s old is new again.
If you worked in a tech office in the late 90’s, every other guy had Ameritrade or similar up in a window. It was the gaming/porn you could get away with at work.
Dot com roasted them all.
Wasn't it still $10/trade back then? That adds user friction, which discourages the gambling aspect much more than "free" trades provided by Robinhood (free as in they'll sell your order flow data to third parties).
Robinhood is an ironic name for the app that enables retail investors get cleaned out by the rich at scale.
I pay my brokerage about that, which is fine, as it works out as less than 0.1% of my average deal - and it’s usually at least five years between a buy and a sell.
When people complain about brokerage fees, or are pleased that their brokerage charge no fees, it usually means they will be losing their shirt at some point.
Volatility trading is for masochists on actual cocaine, and suckers.
As did 2008. A bull market is a hell of a drug, as it were. And yes, we're probably headed for another big correction in the near to medium term future.
There are structural changes that make it much easier to convert trading into gambling. Feeless trades and easy access to margin accounts and more advanced vehicles means that you can easily make dozens of high risk trades in a single day.
> If you worked in a tech office
Office? ;)
I was trading stocks in between my CS classes in the late 90s lol
Same. Good times.-