From Raúl Ilargi Meijer at automaticearth.com:
Let’s start with defining what an ‘investor’ really is. A reasonable definition of an investor seems to be ‘someone who puts money into risk bearing assets that promise to produce financial gains through – increased – productivity’.
If we can agree on that, then furthermore I think we can all agree that investors need markets. And not only that, but they need functioning markets. What defines ‘functioning’ here is that ‘investors’ need to be able to discern what the value is of the assets they have already purchased and/or are thinking of purchasing in the future.
But we haven’t had any functioning markets since at least 2008. There is no price discovery left, nobody knows the actual value of anything anymore, and ‘traders’ pour money into all sorts of ‘assets’ without having one single clue as to what they are really worth. They don’t even care about the real value of the ‘assets’ they purchase. They don’t have to, because the game’s so obviously rigged and distorted.
There is no risk left in the assets, productivity – i.e. the added value – has long since ceased to be an issue, and that leaves financial gains as the only point of our definition above. But that must of necessity also mean that whoever trades in these non-functioning markets – preferably with ‘money’ borrowed on the cheap -, is not an investor.
So what are the people who do trade, while still calling themselves investors? Are they then mere ‘traders’? That doesn’t quite seem to fit.
What are they then? It may sound a bit harsh to claim they are all just plain grifters, but maybe that’s not too far off the truth after all.
http://www.theautomaticearth.com/2015/03/you-think-youre-an-investor-i-think-not/
To continue reading: You Think You’re An Investor?
