Bourses : Are they casinos?

           Bourses : Are they casinos?

                 -  Soma Valliappan 

Is stock market a casino?

Yes.

Is it a huge trading platform?

Yes.

Can we make gain investing through Bourses?

Yes.

What?!  Is 'yes' the sole answer to all the three questions?

For the fourth question also, the answer is same.  Yes.

For,  the stock markets do offer all opportunities - trading, investment and to make gains ......-.  Crores and crores do participate in stock market and do trade,  invest and make gains for quite long. Some successfully,  some chasing the success..

Five blind men trying to figure out what an elephant is a well known story. The first touched the leg and said it was like a pillar.  The second felt the big ear to  be like a sift.  The others touched yet other parts and described the way what they felt like.

In a similar fashion people participating in stock market operations conclude how the market is by attributing to their myriad experiences.

In a casino one either wins or loses. It happens in stock market too. It can't be refuted. Yet one can't generalize a particular experience and conclude there are no alternative,  smart moves to do well.

Using technical analysis is one approach.  There are people who adopt this and make profit by doing either or both of the following types of trading. :

I buy first and sell later

II sell first and cover it up buying later, in stock market parlance this is called going short.

There is a risk of incurring loss also here.

Another approach is to buy stocks after doing fundamental analysis or on the expert advice. Hold.  And when the prices go up to a reasonable or expected level,  make gain by selling them.

To cite an instance,  if one had bought Wipro shares worth of Rs. 10000/- in 1980, its current market value would have been Rs.806 crores.  There are many other good blue chip stocks as well. There are those successful investors still.

Thus Bourses can't be concluded as a gambling den. True there are speculators who use the platform as an arena for gambling.  These scare away small and benign investors from the stock markets. If one doesn't look for any short term gain but would adopt a balanced long term approach and invest in good scripts,  one can get far better Return on investment in stocks than in any other investments.

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It's a humble attempt to get an English version of Annan Soma Valliappan's article in community magazine,  'ஆச்சி வந்தாச்சு ',  October 2021 edn and கல்கி

Subramanian Ramanathan