The Gambler

It is a song penned by D. Schlitz, and famously covered by Kenny Rogers, but it is also descriptive of a person I know. He liked to play those video lotteries. Of course that is risky, and given the odds, you can't win. The lottery corporation always wins if you play long enough.

People like to compare the stock market to gambling. So do I. It looks like the house always wins. But the major differences are many and varied. For one you can play the house in the stock market, less a portion of the vig. Gambling is winner take all, less the vig. Therein lies the allure of gambling. You double nearly half the time, but the house wins in a tie.

The payoffs are a lot more complicated in the stock market, and they are generally smaller, but can be bigger too. There are a lot more games as well including let's play house minus commissions. There are even binary options, a custom game of high-low with a win or lose payout where the odds are stacked against you.

People "cheat" on both games. Insider trading can get you in hot water if you are caught. Some people are banned in Vegas because they have an "unfair" advantage. Canadians are banned in Chicago even though they run the place like a rented mule with TD Ameritrade (That TD stands for Toronto Dominion Bank by the way.) "Banned in Vegas" is worn like a badge of honor; "Banned in Chicago," YMMV. You must be an Approved Canadian "cheater" on their side in The Pits. A "cheater" is anybody who beats them a lot I guess.

They are supposed to keep how you beat them a secret just like poker players do not have to show their cards when everybody else folds. That looks like it is so they can use it exclusively to cheat everybody with your "secret".  In Vegas your secret is good; "What happens in Vegas..." Chicago, a little different... Turd Ferguson from TF Metals likes to call them "The Crooks." They can wait 72 hours after you "Win" so they can change the game in their favor. A friend I know says, "If you find a way to beat them, they'll change it so that you can't."

So what if you play the House? There has to be a point where they wallop themselves over the head too. Hmmm... ;)