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What Happens When a Fifteen Year Old Pumps and Dumps with a Net Profit of $800k? (2002)

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141–150 of 182 posts

Re: What Happens When a Fifteen Year Old Pumps and Dumps with a Net Profit of $800k? (2002)

#141
post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It certainly is more democratic than any alternatives I'm aware of. If you don't want someone to accumulate more economic influence, do not pay them. The government will not jail you for doing so. If business is controlled by a democratically elected government, and 49% of the country voted against those officials, there is no way for them to start their own alternative business to articulate those preferences in the…

> It certainly is more democratic than any alternatives I'm aware of It's no different at all, to any other economic system. > If business is controlled by a democratically elected government, and 49% of the country voted against those officials, there is no way for them to start their own alternative business to articulate those preferences in the market. If you have 1 dollar and I have one hundred thousand, the sam…

It is not the same. You can build your own business and the guy with one hundred thousand dollars does not have any ability to prevent you from doing that under the law. The hierarchy under capitalism is very different.

Re: What Happens When a Fifteen Year Old Pumps and Dumps with a Net Profit of $800k? (2002)

#142

Crypto is basically this writ large. So many kids being taught that scamming is how to succeed

Not really, way more kids are getting caught in the crypto scams than are making money doing them.

Re: What Happens When a Fifteen Year Old Pumps and Dumps with a Net Profit of $800k? (2002)

#143
Some people say with a straight face: "Hey if someone is stupid enough to believe something I say, it's not my fault, even if I say something I know is false."

And enough other people like being able to cash in at that same well that they avoid working towards making it officially illegal with significant penalties.

It's that John Oliver piece on timeshares all over the place in essentially every arena.

Re: What Happens When a Fifteen Year Old Pumps and Dumps with a Net Profit of $800k? (2002)

#144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the only thing he was taking advantage of was the gullibility of the general public. Like every conman, snake oil salesman, scammer, and fraudster. Why treat him any differently? He should be tarred, feathered, and run out of town.

> He should be tarred, feathered, and run out of town. I can't imagine what this could possibly mean. What should actually happen to him for posting messages on message boards?

> What should actually happen to him for posting messages on message boards?

If the problem was "posting messages on message boards" we'd all be just as guilty, but obviously that's not the case. That's like saying that someone who stabbed a person to death got punished for "using cutlery". People who intentionally hurt others for profit should be treated as such, no matter if they're mugging their victims or scamming them. He's no better than a Nigerian prince who uses email or the "pig butchers" who use SMS/MMS/social media.

Re: What Happens When a Fifteen Year Old Pumps and Dumps with a Net Profit of $800k? (2002)

#145

Crypto is basically this writ large. So many kids being taught that scamming is how to succeed

Not really, way more kids are getting caught in the crypto scams than are making money doing them.

The ones who got caught are still taking away the lesson that scammers win.

Re: What Happens When a Fifteen Year Old Pumps and Dumps with a Net Profit of $800k? (2002)

#148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So you trick people by lying to them, and it's ok because you take their money indirectly via the stock market No one was arguing that it was indirect; the people who lost money took advice from an anonymous user on a forum on tiny companies they'd never heard of. The morality question is still interesting because it hinges on whether or not people knew they were playing a game with deception.

These situations always remind me of a quote from Clark Howard who was a radio host of personal finance shows. "It's almost impossible to get scammed if you're not a greedy person"

It's not though. Greed isn't involved for all the well meaning naifs who are just wiring cash to bail out their wayward grandson after he called them on facebook, or received mail indistinguishable from a bill and sent back a check.

Re: What Happens When a Fifteen Year Old Pumps and Dumps with a Net Profit of $800k? (2002)

#149
post #80
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? Merching in RS3 always seemed to be more of a pump and dump than anything that overlapped with real life quantitative investing

If theyre working as quants now, they were probably around before RS3 as well. I remember daytrading the grand exchange personally. There were plenty of profitable patterns that were basically guaranteed to work. I can see how someone who could program at the time could get much higher volumes by automating multiple accounts. The problem was finding profitable new trades at different levels of wealth, what worked at…

RuneScape really taught about scams, huh.

Re: What Happens When a Fifteen Year Old Pumps and Dumps with a Net Profit of $800k? (2002)

#150

There was a recent decision out of Texas that pump and dumps are legal if you do them without directly selling stock to the victims. So I guess that according to Texas what this guy did is totally fine! [PDF] https://assets.bwbx.io/documents/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/rmMOgPQg... or coverage from Matt Levine: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-03-21/pump-a...

i'll admit i was a little shocked when the case was dismissed. for anyone not familiar with Atlas Trading this page gives a bit of an overview: https://bullishbears.com/atlas-trading-lawsuit/
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